


Hello Captain (Steve Rogers)

by Rogerthatbarnes



Series: Hello [1]
Category: Marvel, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Clintasha - Freeform, F/M, Falling In Love, Fluff, Friendship, Moving On, Post-Captain America: The First Avenger, SHIELD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-24
Packaged: 2019-04-26 19:59:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 38
Words: 166,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14409528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rogerthatbarnes/pseuds/Rogerthatbarnes
Summary: Book 1 of the Hello Series"Are you okay, ma'am? I'm so sorry..." my voice trailed off as my eyes reached her face. It felt like time stopped for a moment and the Hulk had punched the wind right out of me as I stared at her in shock.She smiled and stepped closer, offering her hand to me. "I'm Sarah Evans. I just moved in next door."----Contains some language and adult content------***I don't own any characters other than those I created. Not totally canon - I don't faithfully follow the MCU timelines, but this story takes place after Avengers but before Winter Soldier. ***





	1. Hello

Sarah's POV

I dropped the last of my boxes onto the couch in my small apartment in Washington, DC. Most of the big stuff was already here and unpacked. I had been bringing stuff in for the past two weeks just to get to know the area and so I wouldn't feel so rushed. I'd already pushed my parents and friends out and sent them home so I could finish up. I loved them, but I was ready to be alone for a bit. 

This was one of the quaintest places I had looked at from the list of Shield housing I'd been given to choose from. I'd loved it at first sight. An older building on the outside, it had the best tech security currently available. I'd been told that most of the tenants in my building were current agents or family of former agents and met a couple of them while we were moving the last of my personal effects in and they seemed nice. 

Kate, who lived on the opposite side of the hall from me, and I hit it off right away and planned to go running before work the next day. Steve lived on the other side of me. I couldn't say what he thought of me, but I'd certainly surprised him. 

I had just walked out my door and locked it, turning to go down the stairs. He'd been bent over kneeling, tying his shoe, I think. Needless to say, I tripped over him and instinctively did a front aerial flip back onto my feet, facing him. He stood up fluidly, hands raised in front of him defensively, lowering them when he realized I wasn't attacking him on purpose. His eyes swept over me with concern.

"Are you okay, ma'am? I'm so sorry..." His voice trailed off as his eyes reached my face.

"Oh, I'm fine. I'm so sorry - I just didn't see you there. Are you okay? I think I accidentally kicked you pretty hard," I babbled as I looked him over, my eyes widening as I took in his impressive physique. 

He was handsome and blonde, hair cropped short and parted, combed over neatly. It was a style that made him look younger, but not one I saw often in men his age. I had to lean my head back to see all of him- he was tall, too; not towering over me, but he was probably at least 6'2. He looked older than I was, maybe mid 20's. His tight Under Armor shirt clung to his well defined muscles; his physique nothing to sniff at. He was wearing sweatpants but I was certain his legs were just as toned. I assumed he was a Shield agent if he was living here, his defensive response was pretty quick.

He shook his head slightly, like he was clearing it, and blinked a couple times. I knew I had this effect on people sometimes when they weren't prepared to meet me. I had asked my friends about it when I was younger; Jace told me suddenly getting my whole attention was like getting the air knocked out of you. Chloe was convinced it was because I was beautiful- which I openly scoffed - I wasn't anything special to look at: curly brown hair, plain brown eyes. Uncle Kev said it was because I had such a dynamic personality. 

Whatever the reason, I had learned to give people a moment to pull themselves together when they first met me. I waited for his cobalt blue eyes to meet my golden brown ones and I put my hand out to him, smiling and stepping closer.

"I'm Sarah Evans. I just moved in next door."

"Steve Rogers," He returned my smile as he took my hand and clasped it firmly. "I'm fine, thank you. Nice to meet you, Miss Evans." 

"Sarah's fine, please." I grinned at his use of the old-fashioned honorific, not moving to take my hand back yet since he hadn't released it yet. He had large, warm, strong, hands with long fingers that curled all the way around my much smaller hand. It was unexpectedly pleasant, feeling small and dainty for once. 

Now that I was standing closer to him I could smell his cologne; I took a deeper breath, considering it - masculine, a hint of spice, not overly strong - it suited him. It wasn't overwhelming, if I wasn't standing close to him, I probably wouldn't have noticed it, which was a pleasant change. Most guys his age drenched themselves in the stuff, giving me a headache and in general making it hard to breathe.

"Do you need any help moving? I was just going down to the exercise room, but that can wait."

"I'm all done for now, but thanks." I normally would have decided by now that I wasn't interested in the man in front of me and brushed him off; to my surprise, I found that I wanted to talk to him a little more, so I asked, "There's an exercise room?" 

He nodded. "Yes, it's in the basement. I suppose you haven't had time to look around yet. If you want, I can show you where it is?"

"That would be great! I was hoping that I wouldn't have to go in early to use the gym at work all the time." I gently tugged my hand from his to push some of my curls out of my face and pivoted beside Steve as he shut his door and moved toward the stairs. 

We went down the four flights it took to get to the basement but didn't speak. Dashing down stairs doesn't really lend itself to conversation; we took them pretty quick. I followed Steve as he pointed out the laundry room and led me through another door into the workout space. 

I bounced on my toes around the room, grinning happily as I took in the punching bag and wooden floor that would be perfect for dance and martial arts workouts. There were some weights, a treadmill, an elliptical and an exercise bike. The far wall was even lined with mirrors and there was a flat screen TV mounted to the wall with a stereo and DVD player connected.

"This is great! It's better than I thought it was going to be!" I glanced over at Steve, who was watching me with a bemused smile on his face. My cheeks flushed as I realized how silly I'd probably looked to him, flitting all over the room and getting excited over gym equipment of all things. 

Steve started wrapping up his hands to use the punching bag. "I think I'm the only one that really uses it. Can't say I ever see anyone else down here, but it's available to everyone."

"It'll be awesome to not have to drag a big duffle bag to work every day. I like running, too, but it's nice to switch it up a bit." 

I walked back over to him, intending to thank him and leave him to his workout. Not like I wouldn't have loved to watch him all day, but I knew some people liked to work out alone and I wasn't dressed for my own workout right now.

"Thanks for showing me. I don't think I would have known it was here otherwise." 

He looked up from what he was doing, clearly having done it so much he didn't need to focus on it. He smiled gently, meeting my eyes with his cobalt ones for a long moment before speaking. 

"You're welcome, Sarah."

"Bye, Steve." 

I caught another whiff of his cologne as I pushed open the heavy door and made my way up the stairs to the lobby. I was suddenly very glad that I had chosen this apartment after all, smiling to myself as I thought about the handsome blonde next door.

I was done moving my stuff in, but I still needed to get groceries. I had talked my mom out of letting her do it even though I knew she had really wanted to because I wanted to wander a little bit and get my bearings. There was a small grocery store two or three blocks away and I could use the fresh air. 

* * *

Steve's POV

I opened the door to the hallway and fumbled my keys, dropping them on the floor. Sighing, I knelt down to pick them up. Today was not my day. Seconds later, I felt a hard blow to my ribs and heard something moving over me and thump next to me. I rose up in ready stance, slipping my keys into my pocket; I wasn't expecting an attack outside my apartment – I was certain the hall had been clear when I opened my door. 

Looking over, I saw a brunette next to me that had to have been the source of the blow. No one else was in the hallway. I quickly realized she had to have tripped over me coming out of her door. I was surprised she hadn't fallen; I wasn't exactly a small man. 

She looked like she was all right as I ran my gaze over her in a quick assessment. Better than all right, if I was honest with myself. Trim ankles gave way to shapely legs and a lovely figure that her summer clothes accentuated. I was still not used to the exposed way that women in this century dressed, but I could appreciate a striking body as well as the next man, and hers was incredible.

"Are you okay, ma'am? I'm so sorry..." my voice trailed off as I reached her face. It felt like time had stopped for a moment and the Hulk had punched the wind right out of me. She looked like Peggy Carter, my first love, but slightly different. Her hair was much longer and had a reddish tint to it beneath the brown. It was really curly, falling across her face and hiding it from me. Her eyes were a lighter brown than Peggy's were, more golden than chocolate. My chest ached as I drew in a quick breath, surprised my lungs remembered how to function. 

"Oh, I'm fine. I'm so sorry – I just didn't see you there. Are you okay? I think I accidentally kicked you pretty hard." 

She didn't sound like Peggy in the least; the woman's accent was American, her voice was slightly higher and she spoke rapidly as she apologized for something that wasn't her fault considering I was sure I had tripped her. She smiled and stepped closer, offering her hand for a handshake. 

"Hello, I'm Sarah Evans. I just moved in next door."

"Steve Rogers," I returned her smile, not wanting to look like a complete idiot, and taking her hand firmly. An electric shock ran up my arm at the physical contact. "I'm fine, thank you. Nice to meet you, Miss Evans." I wasn't very good at guessing women's ages, but I was sure she was younger than me by at least 5 years. She looked younger than Peggy when I had first met her at Camp LeHigh in 1943.

"Sarah's fine, please." She grinned endearingly and small dimples appeared. Her delicate hand was completely engulfed in mine. I marveled at the soft but firm feel of her skin. 

I knew someone had rented the apartment next to mine, but I hadn't realized they were moving in already. I knew furniture came with the lease, but if she was on her own, she might need assistance with the kind of boxes people used to move nowadays. I hadn't heard anyone else next door since I had gotten in a little while ago, so I decided to offer my services, if only to spend a little more time with this girl that reminded me so much of Peggy. I wasn't ready to let her out of my sight yet, even though I knew she wasn't who I had initially thought she was.

"Do you need any help moving? I was just going down to the exercise room, but that can wait."

"I'm all done for now, but thanks. There's an exercise room?" 

I nodded. "Yes, it's in the basement. I suppose you haven't had time to look around yet. If you want, I can show you where it is."

"That would be great! I was hoping that I wouldn't have to go in early to use the gym at work all the time." 

She gently tugged her hand from mine to push some of riotous curls that had fallen into her eyes out of her face. I reached behind me to shut my door and moved toward the stairs. She fell into step beside me and I breathed in her light perfume. It was floral with a hint of fruitiness. I had smelt it before – it seemed to be a popular one for women – but on her it was intoxicating.

We went down the four flights it took to get to the basement but didn't speak. I dashed down stairs quickly, I still didn't know what to say to such a beautiful dame. She followed as I pointed out the laundry room and led her through another door into the workout space. 

I watched her bounce around the room on her toes, grinning like I had given her a particularly great gift. I drank in her refreshing openness and natural vibrance. Her face was particularly expressive and she moved gracefully in a way that reminded me of how Natasha moved. 

I decided that she must enjoy dancing in order to be that thrilled with the wooden floor. She looked over the punching bag; the free weights and other equipment also seemed to make her happy, especially the stereo and video player. I pulled the gauze I used to wrap my hands out of my pocket; I was going to need some time to collect my thoughts, and pounding the leather was my method of choice.

"This is great! It's better than I thought it was going to be!" 

She glanced over at me then as she finally noticed me watching her flit around the room, her cheeks filled with color, which only made her more attractive. She didn't wear face paint - makeup, I think Natasha called it - and I was glad she didn't; she was beautiful without it. I felt my body stir; I hadn't felt this physically attracted to anyone in a long, long, time.

I started wrapping up my hands - partly to give me something to do and partly because they itched to touch her, to see if her hair was as soft as it looked - I could wrap my hands in my sleep, I had done it so much lately. 

"I think I'm the only one that really uses it. Can't say I ever see anyone else down here," mostly because I come down here late at night when I couldn't sleep or early in the morning when I woke up from a nightmare, "but it's available to everyone." 

"It'll be awesome to not have to drag a big duffle bag to work every day. I like running, too, but it's nice to switch it up a bit." She walked back over to where I still stood by the door and looked at me, waiting for me to meet her eyes.

"Thanks for showing me." Her voice was softer, but still sincere as I looked up from my hands to her face. "I don't think I would have known it was here otherwise." Her eyes held mine for a long moment and I had to mentally shake myself free of her mesmerizing gaze. 

"You're welcome, Sarah."

"Bye, Steve." She said as she walked past me out the door.

I took a deep breath to steady myself, instead I got a good whiff of her perfume, which only made me wish that she had stayed. I walked over to the punching bag only to realize that since she had been everywhere, her scent lingered in the room. 

My chest throbbed painfully and I struggled to just breath normally. I knew I didn't have asthma anymore – couldn't have it anymore – but it still felt like the worst asthma attack I ever remembered having. I closed my eyes and fell to my knees, refusing to give in to the hot prickle in my eyes and fighting the tight ache closing off my throat. 

All I could think about was Peggy. I thought I had lost her when I had been revived. I knew Peggy was still alive, but it wasn't quite the same. In the 70 years I had been gone, she had lived a full life, had moved on, married a good man and had his children; she had aged like humans were supposed to, into an old woman, while I was still the same physical age as when I crashed that bomber in the Arctic. I wasn't sure if God was playing a cruel joke on me by putting Sarah in my path, or if this was his way of giving me a second chance for good behavior.


	2. Speculation

Sarah's POV

My alarm went off at 5 am and I laid there for a minute gathering my thoughts. I was supposed to meet Kate in a half hour for our run. I threw off the covers and got out of bed, the wooden floor cold beneath my feet. I went to the bathroom and pulled my long, curly auburn hair back into a tight ponytail and found a headband to help keep the fuzzies from popping out everywhere. I brushed my teeth quickly and went to change into running clothes. 

I kept it simple; shorts and a tank top. It was quite warm already this morning, which meant it was going to be a miserably hot day. I laced up my favorite running shoes and glanced out the peephole to see if Kate was outside already. I could hear Steve moving around already on the other side of my bedroom wall. I guess he was an early riser, too. I had found myself wondering about him at odd times yesterday and regretted that I hadn't the courage yesterday to ask him if he wanted to go get coffee together sometime. I was sure that I would have another chance, eventually, and I looked forward to our next meeting.

I checked my phone; I still had 10 minutes. Scrolling through social media to get caught up on my friends, I heard a quiet knock on my door. I jumped up to see Kate in track shorts and a formfitting racer back tank top.

"Hey, I'm just going to grab my keys and I'm ready." I tucked my phone and keys into my flip belt since I hated things weighing down my pockets and hitting me when I ran. "Do I need my pepper spray or taser? Is it pretty safe around here?" The blond didn't look like she had anything other than her phone or keys in her wrist bag, but I figured I'd better ask in case I went on my own sometime. I actually didn't need either of those things, but I figured the average female probably would.

"No, the route I take is pretty well traveled and there are always officers in the park."

"Good to know." I grinned as we headed out the door, this time looking before I went past Steve's door. Kate seemed like a morning person, too. We were quiet as we went down the stairs, most people were still sleeping and I didn't want to wake anyone up with our chatter. I followed Kate's lead when we got outside. She looked like she was in fairly good shape, but not everyone ran like I preferred to - all out for at least 10 miles. As a Shield agent, I was trained to blend in, so no showing off - at least, not yet. We kept to a quick jog that was comfortable to speak during.

"So did you get all your stuff moved in?"

"Yeah, didn't take very long. It's nice that all of the big furniture was provided in my lease. Made things a lot easier. I think it took longer to convince my folks that I'll be fine than anything else!"

Kate laughed. "Must be your first place, then?"

"Yeah. Just graduated last week, so I figured it was time. This place is pretty close to work, though, so that's a plus. Where do you work at?"

"I'm a nurse at the VA hospital, so I usually work 12 hour shifts and rotate through the different wards."

"Sounds rewarding."

"Yeah, it is."

"Oh, did I tell you I met my other neighbor yesterday?" I said as we started to turn onto another road.

"No. Jake or Steve?" She glanced at me, taking in my silly grin.

"Steve."

"Handsome, isn't he? I could look at him all day."

"Uh-huh. Definitely. Who's Jake?"

"No changing the subject! So what did you think of Steve?"

"Well, he seems nice. I tripped over him in the hall - like actually tripped over him."

"Oh no! Were you okay?"

"Yeah, I was fine, just a little embarrassed. I can't believe I was sooo clumsy! He showed me where the exercise room in the basement was. I didn't even know we had one in the building."

"Huh- Mr. Jones forgot to tell you about it, I guess. Steve is really nice; I hardly ever see him. I don't think he's seeing anyone. Come to think of it, I never see him have friends over or anything. You should invite him to do something with you. He hasn't been living here very long, so he might not know anyone in town outside work."

"I might do that then, once I get settled in and get used to my schedule."

We turned another corner and came up the path to the park. It was well laid out and the paths were wide and well lit even though there were a lot of trees. As Kate had said, it was a pretty busy park, even at 5:45 in the morning.

"Do you know where he works?"

"No, I don't think I've ever asked. I think you've talked to him more than I have already."

"Oh." I thought about that. He didn't seem like an antisocial person, maybe he just worked a lot...and worked out a lot, based on his build. "So who's Jake? He must be in the other apartment on our floor?"

"Yeah. He's pretty cute, too. He's got a girlfriend already and she does not like me!" Her eyes rolled and she grimaced.

"What's he look like?"

"Blond, green eyes, tall – like 6'5 at least, ripped. We definitely have all the pretty people on our floor."

"So I'm the only brunette? Nice. I'll have to watch for him then. What's he do?"

"Security for some bigwig. He's usually wearing a suit when I see him." I considered that. Sounds like he was an active agent then. I still wasn't sure where Kate fit in, unless her parents were Shield or she really was a nurse at the Triskelion. 

We reached the end of the park path and turned to take the other path back. We picked up the pace a bit and just enjoyed the morning for a while as we followed the winding path.

"What time do you have to work today?" I asked as we reached the end of the park and headed back to our building.

"Eight this week. You?"

I checked my watch – 6:30 already.

"Eight. I have orientation this week."

"So where do you work? I'm guessing you just started."

"I'm doing IT for a big tech company. I love computers." My cover was pretty close to the truth, but I knew I wasn't supposed to mention Shield unless I knew they were also Shield.

"I'll keep that in mind for the next time my laptop acts up. I usually have to call one of my coworkers to fix it when it crashes."

"Sure. I should get your number anyways so I don't have to stalk the halls to see if you wanted to go running with me." I giggled at the thought.

"Yeah. I don't have yours either." Kate grinned as we slowed down to walk the last block. We traded phones to put in our contact info. Kate laughed at the selfie I added for my profile picture. I handed back her phone and snapped a head shot of her for her profile.

We made our way back up to our floor and we heard more people up and moving around. I let myself in and put the coffee on while I went to get in the shower. It wasn't a bad run, but I'd hardly worked up a sweat. Kate, on the other hand, was dripping by the time we finished. 

I got ready for work, ate breakfast, checked my email, and put on jeans and a t-shirt. I was supposed to have uniforms waiting for me at work today; Maria Hill, my supervisor, said they should be ready. Ops had forwarded on my measurements and I just had to try them on to make sure they would work. I gave myself plenty of time to get there since I wasn't sure how bad the traffic would be and I had only been at the Triskelion one other time to do the normal start-a-job paperwork, meet my supervisor, and to get my badge and key-cards made. 

I pulled up to the security checkpoint for the guard to scan my badge. He waved me through and I drove over the parking garage and found a spot. Following the signs to the elevator, I got in and told it where I wanted to go. It was a smart elevator that bio-metrically scanned everyone who entered. If someone didn't have clearance for a floor, the elevator wouldn't stop there. I made my way through the halls to my new work space on the 41st floor.

I found Maria in her office and she took me to the locker room I was assigned to on our floor. My locker was bio-metrically locked, so I touched my finger to the keypad and it popped open. My clothes were mostly normal agent suits as well as a couple of navy blue catsuits for missions. Maria told me to try them all on and she would be back in 15 minutes.

I put on the catsuits first since they were more fitted than my other suits would be. They fit like a glove and I checked myself out in the long mirror. I grinned at my reflection. This was going to be awesome!

Finally, I finished trying things on and was just putting on my jacket when Maria came back. I was to be her personal assistant since her duties had increased exponentially with the initiation of the Avengers. Kevin had personally recommended me for the position, and I had to admit my talents were a good fit. A lot of the agents I went to Ops Academy with started out at the Triskelion before being assigned elsewhere, so I was looking forward to seeing everyone...and meeting the Avengers.

Maria looked me over and smiled. She was a beautiful woman with dark brown hair and gray-blue eyes. Her suit was the same as mine: tailored white shirt, navy slacks and jacket. 

"Looks like you're set, Agent Evans. I can't promise that I'll remember to tell you what's going on when you're with me, but I'll try. For the next two weeks you're mostly going to be getting all of your paperwork squared away and meeting various people who you will need to work with sporadically. When you're with me, you'll be observing and figuring out how you will fit in with my duties. Agent Gregg said you know your stuff, and all of your background checks add up. Do you have your earpiece and handgun?"

I nodded and turned my head so she could see it in my left ear. I pulled my M&P 9mm Shield standard issue gun out of its side holster and handed it over to her to inspect it.

"Good." She handed it back to me. I shut my locker and followed her out the door. 

"I'm having one of my trusted Agents show you around today. You'll be meeting her in the lobby by the Shield statue. I would take you there, but I need to get a couple things done before this next meeting."

"It's fine, Agent Hill. I saw it on my way in this morning. When should I check in with you?"

"At the end of the day around 1600 is fine. I don't anticipate you being done before then."

"Okay. See you this afternoon."

I turned and walked back to the elevator. Taking it down to the lobby, I made my way to the statue. I didn't have long to wait before a familiar blond came up to me.

"Sarah? I didn't know you were Shield!"

"Kate!" I gave her a huge smile, happy to know someone here already. "I didn't know you were either. I hadn't had time to check up on anyone on our floor yet, so I gave you my cover story instead."

"Completely fine with me – I hadn't put two and two together yet. I knew Maria's PA was supposed to start this week but I wasn't expecting it to be you."

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?"

"Good. We are definitely outnumbered around here." She gestured at the sea of people around us and it was predominantly male, just like Academy. "Shall we get started? It's going to be a long day."

"Lead on. I still can't believe how huge this place is."

Our first real stop was at IT. I needed to do a skills assessment, spend some time getting my clearances taken care of, and finishing any paperwork they had. Kate took me right to the IT director, apparently at Maria's direction. He told her to come back in two hours and I tapped my phone pocket to indicate I would text her if we finished sooner.

Agent Thurston was prepared for me and had a good idea of what I could do per my Ops files, so he gave me a tablet with a Bluetooth keyboard that was linked into the display screen in his office and had me run through several programs, all ones I was already familiar with from Academy. He knew his stuff, though, and we progressed through more complicated programs and scenarios until we exhausted his repertoire. I then showed off a little by hacking into Stark Industries' private server. 

I laughed when he told me he was glad I was on Shield's side. All of our playing had taken a little over two hours, so Kate was waiting for me in the main office, chatting with one of the techs. Agent Thurston shook my hand and sent us to a specific office to get my clearances taken care of.

I was issued Level 7 across the board, the same as Kate. Given who I was supposed to be working with, 7 was the bare minimum, although it was higher than Tony Stark and Thor.

By the time we got that all finished it was almost noon, so we took a lunch break in the cafeteria where Kate introduced me to some of the people I was going to be working with around the Triskelion when we were there. Part of my job meant that I would be going wherever Maria went or sent me, and I knew she wasn't always in DC.

After lunch, we went down to get my weapons all squared away. The man in charge, Agent Tripp, greeted Kate brusquely and looked me over. He looked like an ex-Seal, like most of the STRIKE teams. A no nonsense kind of guy, he knew my M&P 9mm was compliant, having already checked it out. My other personal weapons, such as my various knives and short swords had all been scanned and registered in the system so if they were lost they could be routed back to me. He insisted on a skills demonstration, probably because of my youthful, nonthreatening appearance and the eclectic nature of my personal weapons.

I passed his shooting test with flying colors, earning a raised eyebrow from him. I then took off my jacket for the knife throwing demonstration he then had me do. I might have showed off just a little, because he set me a harder test with my short swords against him. I toed off my shoes and socks, choosing to go barefoot for this one. I checked my range of motion in my suit and was pleased at how well it allowed for fighting. It wasn't as good as my catsuit, but it would do for today.

We had a pleasant match, with him winning only because I tore a couple seams maneuvering. Agent Tripp gruffly approved of me and invited me back anytime for a workout. I told him I would take him up on that and come properly attired next time, which made him laugh.

We had to go back up to 41st after I put my shoes and socks back on so I could change my suit, much to Kate's amusement. 

"I haven't ever heard Tripp laugh, Sarah. Ever!"

"What can I say? People tend to like me when they get to know me...or work out with me." 

After I changed, we spent the next hour going around the floors below mine and Kate pointed out the various departments, taking me to meet their supervisors whenever they were free. Most of the time, we didn't have to wait very long after giving our names to the gatekeepers and secretaries, which was nice. A lot of people were quite curious about who Maria Hill would allow to work with her teams and I think I left good impressions with most of them. As I figured, my relative lack of age was an anomaly. Most of the people in positions of power at the Triskelion, with the exception of Communications and IT, were old enough to be my parents, at the very least. 

At 1600, we headed upstairs to Maria's office by stairway so I could learn where those were. Kate left me at the 40th floor and said she'd meet me tomorrow in the same place. She said she had some things to finish by the end of the day. I thought it seemed like she was trying to avoid my floor whenever possible. I wasn't sure if that was protocol or for personal reasons. For the most part, only the Avengers and their support staff were on the 41st floor in this third of the building.

Maria was in her office when I got there and visited with me briefly before dismissing me for the day. Tomorrow would be more of the same, so I went to change and head home. The drive home took a little longer due to hitting some rush hour traffic before I turned off the main route.

I didn't see Kate or Steve when I got back to my apartment, so I made supper and spent some time unpacking a couple more of my boxes. I had about half of them done already, but it took a while to find places for everything. It wasn't like at home where I knew where everything went. My mom called while I was unpacking and I told her how my day went. I think she was a little disappointed I hadn't met the Avengers yet, but she was glad I had made a new friend in Kate. Mom put my dad on after that and I told him about my weapons test and made him feel better about leaving his little girl all alone in the big city.

The next couple days passed in a blur; I got in some good workouts at the huge gym at the Triskelion each morning before showering and tagging along behind Kate for more meet and greets. Kate dragged me everywhere until I was convinced I had met pretty much every high ranking person in the Triskillion. The way that they all talked to me was respectful and courteous. I got the impression that I would be working with some of them a lot more than I initially thought I would; it didn't sound like Maria enjoyed the tedious meetings a person in her position had to attend.

I had a couple more assessments with different departments, including a driving test, where I ran a simulation while driving a motorcycle, an automatic transmission, a manual transmission pickup, a semi-truck, a helicopter and a small fixed wing plane. I passed them all tolerably well considering I didn't have much experience with semi's or flying small aircraft. Maria said that eventually someone would be giving me lessons on how to fly the Quinjet, which had the capability of working as a hovercraft or fixed wing plane interchangeably, and had cloaking capabilities since my team preferred them for most missions. 

My favorite assessment so far was the language one. I had spent about half of the day on Thursday at Communications going through verbal simulations with native language speakers for all 10 of the languages I spoke fairly fluently. According to my report, I passed them all with flying colors. Word-wise I could fit in as a native language speaker of French, Italian, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Greek, American Sign Language, and Russian. Temperament-wise, I wasn't quite as docile as a woman from the Mandarin and Arabic-speaking countries would be, but no one was perfect. 

The Communications Supervisor, Agent Larson, I got along with quite well. He was an attractive black haired blue eyed man in his thirties, slightly taller than me and well built. He spoke with a well modulated baritone with a light French accent, which was pleasant to listen to. He asked me on a date after we finished my assessment, which I hedged on, saying I wasn't sure what my duties were going to be yet, but agreed to meet him for coffee Friday morning at 7:30, before work.

I went in early for my morning workout so I would be done in time to meet Eric for coffee. He insisted on getting mine for me and we spent a little bit of time visiting and getting to know each other. I liked him fine, but I wasn't really interested in him - he was a little too old for me. I managed to work my age into the conversation and he was slightly dismayed at my youth, apparently thinking that I was older than I was. We parted amicably and I went up to my floor to meet with Maria to start the day.

"How was your date?" Maria asked with a grin when I came into her office.

I shrugged and smiled. "He was nice, but he's 34 - way too old for me!"

Maria laughed. "He's been trying to get me to agree to a date for as long as he's worked here."

"That explains a few things. You're in luck, though. I didn't make any plans for you, but if you want, I can arrange a date for you?"

"Good God, no! Kate's with you for today to go over a couple more things and you're free to go whenever you get done. I'm leaving for the helicarrier in a little bit, so text me if you need anything and I'll see you Monday, Sarah."

"Sounds good. You're sure you don't want me to come along with you?"

"I'm sure. This meeting is above your clearance level, so you couldn't attend anyways."

"All right. Have a good weekend, Maria."


	3. Meet the Avengers

Sarah's POV

I spent the weekend doing laundry and running errands. I was mildly surprised to notice that I had made it a whole week without seeing Steve once. I saw Kate several times in the hallway and had finally met Jake yesterday on my way back from doing errands. Funnily enough, I had crashed into him as well. If there was an embarrassing way to meet handsome men, I guess I could manage it.

I had been looking down at my phone as I came up the stairs, reading a longer message from Chloe when I had collided with his broad chest as I stepped up to the top stair. He had caught me by my shoulders when I had bounced off him, keeping me from falling back down the stairs. He backed up a couple steps so we were both on level ground before letting me go.

"Oh! I'm so sorry! I wasn't looking where I was going." I smiled up at him apologetically and after a moment, he collected himself enough to reply. I studied him while I waited. He was everything Kate had said, blond, green eyes, at least 6'5, and totally ripped. I guessed he was in his late twenties, and while he was quite handsome, I wasn't really attracted to him.

"It's okay; I wasn't looking either. Are you all right?"

"Yeah. Thanks for catching me; that could have been a bad fall. I'm Sarah Evans, by the way. I just moved in across the hall." I held my hand out to him and he grasped it firmly, his hand engulfing mine. 

"I'm glad that you didn't fall. It's nice to meet you, Sarah. I'm Jake McCartney." He smiled back at me and I noticed he had cute little dimples.

"Nice to meet you, too, Jake; that takes care of everyone on our floor. I've already met Kate and Steve." I pulled my hand back when he would have continued to hold it and jerked a thumb at their respective doors. "Have a good day!" I chirped and turned to go to my apartment, brushing past him.

* * *  
Monday morning I met Maria at our office at a little before 0800. "We only have a standard pre-op planning meeting today unless something else comes up, but it will take the whole day. From now on while we are in DC, I expect you to just meet me here at 0800 sharp, dressed and ready to go. You should keep one of each of your suits at your apartment in case we get called up, but otherwise it's fine to just change here. Did you get everything unpacked this weekend?" I followed her down the hall, not sure where we were headed. I really hadn't explored this floor much yet.

"Yes ma'am. I didn't realize how much stuff I had. I swear my mom packed everything I might ever possibly need...and then some. I love my building – it's got character."

Maria laughed at my enthusiasm and gestured to the board room to my right. We went in and I could tell we were the last to get there. The meeting hadn't started yet, but everyone paused when we walked in. Suddenly, I had the undivided attention of all of the Avengers, minus Thor. It was a little disconcerting for me – I was meeting my idols, after all – but it must have been a surprise for them as well.

"Good morning. This is Agent Sarah Evans, level 7. She's a fully trained agent from Ops and will be the new personal assistant that Director Fury says I need." Maria addressed the group calmly. I didn't know what I was going to be getting into, but this was going to take some getting used to.

"Hello." I smiled, looking at each person in turn. I had seen their pictures everywhere after the Battle of New York last month and videos of them in action, so their faces were mostly familiar to me. Clint Barton nodded his head at me, seeming more interested in his coffee than anything else. Bruce Banner smiled back, clearly concerned at my apparent youth. Natasha grinned, and I was a little anxious even though it was clear she was just mostly amused. 

Tony Stark smirked and gave me a definite once over, obviously liking what he saw. I mentally rolled my eyes, knowing I had better be able to sidestep away from the playboy billionaire. Director Fury gestured for me to come to him, so I walked over to the older man, wondering what he had in store for me. He handed me a tablet and looked me over, adjusting quickly to me despite my affect on him. I was sure nothing really threw him for long.

"Welcome to Shield. Agent Gregg speaks very highly of you, Agent Evans."

"Thank you, sir." I smiled fondly. "I hold Agent Gregg in very high esteem." Director Fury started to smile in return. "And he told me to tell you 'hello and why hasn't the realest person I've ever met called me back yet'." Fury laughed outright, drawing everyone's eyes.

"Yeah, I'd better move that up on the list, then." He waved me over to the open chair next to Maria. It was then that I noticed that the only other person I hadn't looked at yet was sitting next to me – Captain America, Steve Rogers – my next door neighbor.

"Hello Steve." I smiled at him as he looked up at me, a nonplussed look on his handsome face.

"Hello Sarah. Now your graceful recovery makes more sense." He gave me a small smile before leaning back to give Maria a speaking look.

I took my seat and woke the tablet, ready to get to work while Fury started a video up on the big screen at the end of the table.

* * *

We took a break when lunch arrived. Apparently it was easier to have the cafeteria send up a catered lunch than to have the Avengers cause a commotion by their appearance in public. Kate had confirmed that most of them weren't seen in the cafeteria on a regular basis.

I asked Maria where the bathrooms were and she pointed the right direction. When I came back, everything was set up, so I got in line to get lunch and to refill my coffee mug. Steve was in my spot, talking quietly to Maria, so I plopped into his chair next to Natasha, not knowing what to expect. My briefing on her had said she didn't like to be approached by strangers, so I left it up to her to start a conversation or not. I was still taking it all in. It's one thing to hear about your heroes on the news; it's another to be working with them day-in and day-out...at least I hoped I was going to be.

Eventually Natasha finished her conversation with Clint, who was finally alert. I was convinced that either he or Natasha were telepathic because their conversation sure didn't make a lot of sense. I did already know that Clint was partially deaf; every now and then Natasha would sign something to him and I understood what was signed but it didn't add to the verbal conversation.

She turned to me with a cheeky grin. "So I hear that you fell for Rogers already?"

I groaned at her double entendre. "Not like that! I did actually trip over him last week but caught myself before I fell down the stairs."

Her smirk widened. "So what exactly did you do to catch yourself? I doubt it was something boring like smacking the floor with your face."

I sighed. "I just did an aerial flip, capoeira. I really hate falling flat on my face."

"Great. You're my new training partner tomorrow then."

"Sure, if it's fine with Maria. I don't know what's on the schedule for tomorrow yet."

I glanced over to see Steve and Maria looking at us. My cheeks flushed since I was certain they had heard the whole thing. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Tony watching me with a strange expression on his face, but when I looked over at him it smoothly shifted to his bored genius mask.

Maria nodded and glanced at her phone to see what tomorrow held. "Sure, Sarah can join you for training tomorrow morning after our a.m. briefings. I'll be gone after that, so someone will have to show her where to go, but her badge will get her in." 

Natasha smiled in return and I got up to clear away plates and such, taking as many as I could stack and then coming back for the rest. Steve was still eating, but almost everyone else had finished and handed me their plates to stack in the plastic tub catering had left. I grabbed the coffee pot to refill my mug and found Clint's empty mug sliding across the table to me, so I filled it, pushing it back to him. I topped off Steve's and Maria's on the way back to the coffeemaker, draining the pot. I returned it to the warmer and started brewing another one. These guys sure went through a lot of coffee.

Lunch was over and the table was cleared, so everyone pulled their tablets and notes back to them and got ready for the rest of the meeting. I had noticed that it was okay to get up and move around during this kind of meeting. It seemed more like a collaborative planning session than anything else. It certainly wasn't like the meetings we had had at Academy. I linked my tablet back into the presentation screen so I could do what Fury wanted on the screen. I had pleasantly surprised him with the quick interactive mock-ups I could get the AI to visualize for the team. 

The AI that was linked to Fury was something I had helped Sci-Tech create based off of the capabilities of Tony Stark's Jarvis AI. Tony gave a single use template to Sci-Tech specifically for that purpose. My team from Ops and an excellent Communications team helped modify it to suit the Director. It was a time consuming, detailed process that would have taken a lot longer without the template. My guess was that Director Fury wouldn't take it directly from Stark without Shield understanding it - and erasing Stark's hidden back doors and tracking schematics. 

I don't think we accomplished everything that Fury wanted to get hammered out today, but we made a good start. At 1600, Fury called a halt and scheduled another session for Wednesday after more Intel came in. Everyone made their way out in pairs, Maria being the last to leave. She was talking to Fury, so I tidied up the table and gathered my tablet and Maria's notes so that I would be ready whenever she was. When I looked up, Nick made a come-hither motion, so I walked over to them.

"Well, Agent Evans, I have to say that I'm glad you decided to join us. Your tech skills are pretty impressive, and we can always use a solid perspective on these kinds of plans." He smiled mischievously; it wasn't a particularly comforting smile coming from him.

"Yes, sir. Glad to be of service."

"Give Agent Romanoff a run for her money tomorrow. I've seen you in action; it'll be good for her."

My surprise must have shown on my face because both of them burst out laughing.

"I'll try, sir. I'm assuming you're familiar with what I can do?"

"Of course. We've been watching you for a long time, Evans. Top candidates in all three academies are always fought over, I just happen to win more often. So tell me, why did you chose Ops instead of Sci-Tech? You would have done just as well there."

I knew this wasn't an idle question. I had thought long and hard over that particular decision before I ever joined Shield, so it wasn't a short answer; he wasn't expecting it to be.

"Because ever since I was a kid, all I wanted to do was become an Agent of Shield. An agent, not a scientist. I wanted to be out there making a difference, saving the world. I spent some time at Sci-Tech while I was at Ops and that made it even clearer to me.

I would have done well there, that's true, but I have the potential and ability to do so much; how could I hide away in a lab when I'm needed in the field. New York only made that more evident. Not all of us can be Avengers – not all of us should be Avengers – but our duty is to stand with them and do the things that they can't do. Not won't, can't. They are the public face of Shield – whether it was intended or not. Now we are their support crew in a rapidly changing world. Above average heroes need above average staff, and I'm one of the few people with enough qualifications and abilities to be an asset to them."

I could tell that it wasn't the answer that they thought they were going to get. Hopefully it was better coming from me than the daily news reports. 

Slow clapping came from the doorway and I turned to see Tony coming back into the room.

"Excellent point, Agent. Out of curiosity, was that your personal opinion or the Academy's?"

"Mine, Mr. Stark." I said quietly, flushing again. This seemed to be my week for embarrassment. He was wearing his public persona like a mask; I must have hit a nerve. No one knew better than Tony that a public screw-up always ended up on the news and in the papers. As it was, he truly had no real privacy; his every move was dissected by the media on a daily basis.

I glanced back at Fury and Maria. They seemed to be having a quick nonverbal conversation but Maria turned and faced me, indicating that we were going. Tony walked up to Fury as we made our way out, and I felt them watching me as I pulled the door shut. We went to Maria's office and I sank tiredly into the chair facing her desk. She looked at me with concern. "Not every day is like this, just so you know." 

I smiled. "Is there a normal around here?"

"Nope. What does that word mean again?"

"I think it's a setting on the dryer."

Maria burst out laughing and I joined in, needing to decompress.

"Did you really trip over Steve?"

"Yup, made a total spectacle of myself. Nailed my aerial flip, though." I grinned, thinking about it. "I take it the team didn't know I was coming in yet."

"They were told I was getting an assistant; I'm sure they weren't expecting, well, you."

If anything, my grin got bigger. "I'm one of a kind, you know."

Maria snorted. "Yeah, join the club. Speaking of which, how do think today went?"

"Planning-wise or me-wise?"

Maria rolled her eyes. I sat back and thought about how they had all reacted to me. I knew Maria really wanted my honest opinion. I hadn't known her for very long, but I respected her. She was a role model for female agents back at Ops.

"Well, provided Natasha doesn't kill me tomorrow, I think we'll be fine. It will take a while to earn her trust and figure out where I fit in. I know I have to be ready to go on missions with you or for you, so it will be good to get a sense of how they work. 

Dr. Banner's main concern is my age, but he doesn't know what I've already accomplished. I'm assuming you have forwarded my file to them?"

She shrugged. "Of course, as of this morning. Whether any of them read it is another story."

My lips quirked, acknowledging the truth there. "Agent Barton doesn't seem to be bothered by me as long as I don't get between him and his coffee. Mr. Stark is going to be a problem until he gets it through his head that I'm not interested in him that way, but I don't anticipate any issues there." My dismissive hand gesture made her smile. "And I'm not sure if Captain Rogers knows what to make of me yet. Do I look like someone he knew?"

Maria's smile was bittersweet. "You are quite perceptive. You look like someone a lot of us knew before she retired." She tapped at her tablet for a bit and then turned it around so I could see the picture on the screen. I felt my chest tighten painfully as I looked at someone who could have been my twin when I was younger. A small label on the side of the photo told me who she was. 

"Peggy Carter? THE Peggy Carter?" Not what I expected, though I really wasn't sure I had any expectations.

"Yes. This isn't a commonly seen picture, though. This is from before she joined the SSR and founded Shield. She's about 16 in this photo. Not going to lie, you probably gave Steve a bit of a shock when he first saw you. Hell, you gave me a bit of a shock the first time I met you. The resemblance is uncanny."

"I don't want to hurt him. He seems like a nice guy." I felt like I had just kicked a puppy. Uncle Kevin was definitely going to have some explaining to do when I saw him next. I didn't want to look up at her just yet. With a few taps I sent the picture to myself so I could study it later and handed back the tablet. "I'll understand if you think I shouldn't be there for certain things and I can move to a different apartment if you think that it would be better. I don't have a lot to move, really." I didn't even really know Steve yet, but I certainly didn't want to make things any more difficult for him. He hadn't had a lot of time to adjust to the 70 year time difference; to him, it hadn't been that long since he thought he had died.

I looked over at Maria, not sure what she was going to say when a male voice came across the coms unexpectedly, making me jump.

"No, Sarah." Steve's deep voice was unmistakable. "I would rather you stay where you are and continue on with your duties- all of them." 

There was only one thing I could say to that, "Yes, sir, Captain Rogers." I tapped the com to transmit and then muted it and jerked it out of my ear. My dismay was apparent. It shouldn't have been transmitting without my intent. It made me wonder if the whole team heard my earlier speech as well as my take on them.

Maria picked it up and looked at it quizzically, but nothing seemed out of place. I knew for a fact it was brand new and had only been added to the team's frequency today per protocol.

"I'll have a new one for you tomorrow. Strange, it wasn't doing that earlier, though. I didn't hear anything until just now and I was watching you, so I know you didn't purposely transmit." Maria's face was sympathetic as she tossed the earpiece on the desk. "If that's what Captain Rogers wants, then that's what we'll do. He's a good man who has had a lot to deal with in the past couple months. Shield is all he knows and the Avengers are a solid fit for a man of his abilities."

I nodded. There had been so much pain in Steve's voice. If he wanted me to stay, I was going to stay and become a true member of this team. If that became a problem, I would do what really needed to be done and remove myself from the picture.

"My offer stays on the table, though. If I am in any way a detriment to the team or Captain Rogers I expect to be reassigned to a different ops team."

She looked at me for a minute, reading my sincerity. Most people would kill to have a position like mine; I had been the target of more than one dirty look this past week. 

"All right; if that's what you want. I won't countermand Captain Roger's request unless it becomes necessary."

I nodded once and went to stand. "I'll be at my desk for a bit if you need anything." I gathered my things, heading for the connecting door that led to my small office. I opened my email and responded to the few that needed attention and left the rest for tomorrow. I had linked Maria's schedule into my own already, so after looking at the rest of the week, I sent Uncle Kevin a text to see if he wanted to do lunch Sunday at my parents since they were expecting me for the weekend. Chloe and Jace were graduating Saturday and I wasn't going to miss their big day.

At 1700, Maria sent me home and I went to the locker room to get my suits and change. I bundled everything I needed up, putting it in the duffle bag that had my name on it.

* * *   
Steve's POV

"Peggy Carter? THE Peggy Carter?" An unfamiliar female voice came across my earpiece as I was getting changed in the locker room. It crackled a moment and then I heard Maria Hill talking to someone, and I was guessing it was Sarah Evans; who else would Maria be talking to like that? I probably should have let them know I could hear them, but I was curious as to why they were talking about Peggy. 

"Yes. This isn't a commonly seen picture, though. This is from before she joined the SSR and founded Shield. She's about 16 in this photo. Not going to lie, you probably gave Steve a bit of a shock when he first saw you. Hell, you gave me a bit of a shock the first time I met you. The resemblance is uncanny." 

Yes, she certainly had given me a shock – that was a bit of an understatement. Both last week and today, seeing her had hit me like a sucker punch. I hadn't been able to get Sarah out of my head, so over the past week, I had actively avoided running into her at our building. I hadn't known she was with Shield until today, though, which changed things in my favor. A non-Shield Sarah couldn't know about what I did as Captain America. I would have to lie to a non-Shield Sarah, and that hadn't sat well with me. Because she was a part of my Shield team, I wouldn't have to hide anything from her that she was allowed to know per clearances, and hers were higher than most.

"I don't want to hurt him," said Sarah quietly after a long pause. "He seems like a nice guy. I'll understand if you think I shouldn't be there for certain things and I can move to a different apartment if you think that it would be better. I don't have a lot to move, really." 

I felt my chest tighten painfully at the thought of her just disappearing. I didn't even really know Sarah yet, but I wanted the chance to get to know her, and that wouldn't happen if she relocated. She sounded sincere, and I knew Maria wouldn't countermand a direct order from me unless she had a very good reason; there were some benefits to being a living legend.

"No, Sarah." I tapped my com to transmit, "I would rather you stay where you are and continue on with your duties – all of them." 

"Yes, sir, Captain Rogers," she replied before the signal cut out with a buzz. I wasn't sure whose com was faulty, but I would get a new one tomorrow morning. I threw my stuff in my locker and went downstairs to get my motorcycle and drive home. It was time to stop avoiding my neighbor if I was going to convince her to stay.


	4. What a Day...

Sarah's POV  
"Okay mom. I'm at my apartment now and need to put my groceries away. See you this weekend." I ended the call as I got to the top of the stairs and tucked my phone in my pocket. I guess I shouldn't really have been surprised to see Steve waiting for me; I figured we'd be having a conversation of some sort the moment I heard his voice over the coms earlier.

I had my keys in my hand, along with some groceries, my duffle bag over my shoulder. Steve had showered and changed into sweatpants and a tight Under Armor shirt already, his hair still wet, making it look more light brown than blond. He was leaning against my door, arms crossed and head down, but he straightened up when he heard me at the top of the steps. 

"I'm sorry to bother you, but I think we need to talk, Sarah," he said quietly, eyes meeting mine.

I nodded, "Come on in, Steve." I reached around him and unlocked my door. I moved past him and set the groceries in the kitchen, gesturing for him to come in. "Sorry about the mess, I'm still unpacking yet." 

He stood in the living room, looking around while I went to hang up my suits, taking a minute to pull my hair back and change into shorts and a tank top. I guess the air conditioning wasn't programmed right yet since it was at least 85 degrees in my small apartment. I tinkered with it and got it working, but the thermostat was broken, so I made a mental note to tell Mr. Jones about it tomorrow so it would get repaired properly. 

"Have you eaten?" I asked Steve as I walked back into the kitchen and pulled a couple beers from the fridge. 

"No, not yet. I just got home a little bit ago."

I opened my beer and handed one to Steve, gesturing for him to sit down at the table so he wouldn't be in the way. He looked like he was lost in thought as he watched me unpacking the grocery bags and start cooking. Since it had been kind of a long day, I was making my favorite food, fajitas.

I pulled up a playlist on my phone and with a couple taps had it coming out on surround sound. Adele was my go-to on days like this. I'm a pretty positive, cheerful, person, but I have my odd down moments, too. I looked at Steve surreptitiously while I cooked, waiting for him to start talking, but he didn't. I don't think Steve realized he was watching me the whole time, like he couldn't get enough of me. After I thought about it, I didn't really believe it was Sarah he was seeing. 

I plated up the food and set it on the table, rousing Steve from his thoughts. His startled eyes met mine and I gently said, "It's fine; just eat and then we'll talk." I knew he wasn't expecting me to feed him or anything, but I was starving. I hadn't eaten much for lunch and that seemed like a long time ago.

"What is this?" Steve asked as he picked up his fork and stabbed at the spicy chicken.

"Fajitas. They're my favorite Mexican dish," I said around a mouthful of food. "It's kind of spicy, though." I warned him. Can't say I didn't warn him. Sure enough, he took a quick drink when the heat sank in. I giggled, not very nice of me, but at least they weren't as hot as I would normally make them. 

"So they are. It tastes good, though. So where are you from, Sarah?" he asked before taking another bite. 

I decided that he needed to know who I was so he could separate me from Peggy in his mind. I took a swig of my beer, starting to tell him about Sarah Evans.

"I was born in a small town in South Dakota. Most people out East don't even know the state exists, so the details aren't important. We moved a lot when I was younger, but when I was 12, we moved to New Jersey so I could go to a better school. It was great, I loved living in a college town; there's always something to do. My dad's a history professor and my mom's a nurse, so they were able to make it work so I could go to Princeton." 

"For high school?"

"No, for grad school. I graduated college early and got a full ride scholarship for as long as I attended." I went back to eating for a bit while he thought that over. 

"So you went to college when you were twelve?" He was struggling to wrap his mind around that. I knew that wasn't the norm for most people, but it was for me.

"Yep. I was 10 when I got my undergrad degree, actually. I spent a couple years at Princeton until Agent Gregg said I could finally come to the Shield Ops Academy full time. Ops wouldn't take me officially until I was 14. I could've went to Sci-Tech sooner than that, but I was content to stay at Princeton until I was old enough." I looked up to see him studying me closely.

"How old are you, Sarah?"

"17 - no wait, I'm 18 now. My birthday was a couple weeks ago; I forgot about it with everything that was going on. How old are you?"

"Physically, 25. Biologically, 93. Natasha gave me a cake with 94 candles on it when we became friends after New York even though it wasn't my birthday."

"94 individual candles?" I laughed at the thought of that many candles on a cake. I can only imagine - the heat would've been sweltering. "Did you make a wish?" I teased, and instantly wished I could take it back as I watch emotions flit across his face. I cursed my stupidity; I'd hit a nerve again. I looked down at my plate, the smile slipping from my face.

"I did." He finally answered, his voice rougher than before. I glanced up to see him looking at me, but I was almost certain it wasn't me that he was seeing right then. "I'm still not sure if you're my retribution or my reward."

I raised my eyebrows at his apparent belief in that. "Steven Rogers, I sincerely believe that you are the last person on this earth deserving of retribution." My fervent statement focused his eyes on me. "I don't know if you believe in God anymore, but the God I believe in is a loving God, not a vengeful one. You're still a good man, Steve – 67 years in the ice didn't change that." 

My face flushed when he didn't answer. I quietly finished my food as he put his thoughts in order; my outburst had surprised him. I tossed the empty bottles in the recycle bin and rinsed off my plate and the frying pan, tidying up as I waited for Steve to finish. I poured myself a glass of Coke and pulled a bottle of Captain Morgan from under the sink, adding a solid dollop to my glass. I turned and looked at Steve, raising the bottle so he could see it, but he shook his head. 

"I don't mind it, but I can't get drunk." I raised my eyebrows questioningly. "The serum that they gave me. For some reason, it doesn't matter how much I drink, I won't even get a buzz."

"That's some side effect," I said slowly, and he nodded. "So where's Steve Rogers from?"

"Brooklyn."

"And Captain America? Sorry I didn't recognize you when I first met you. I wasn't aware you had an apartment in this building."

"It's all right; I'm still not used to people knowing who I am." He smiled slightly, shaking his head. "It's still strange to me how often I get approached for pictures." 

"Better you than me. I prefer to avoid the spotlight. Will you tell me your story, Steve?"

"Are you sure you want to hear it? It's kind of a long story."

"I've got time; besides, I'm kinda getting the feeling I should probably hear the whole story from you." 

I took his empty plate from him and rinsed it off, setting it in the sink for later. I went into the living room, turning down the music until it was barely audible while Steve settled on the end of my couch. I plopped down on the other end, tucking my feet under me, my hands wrapped around my cold drink and ready to listen. I was somewhat familiar with the basic story; his miraculous revival had been all over Ops and social media after the Battle of New York. 

"I haven't really ever told anyone my whole story," Steve stalled, searching my face carefully.

"I'm not just anyone," I smiled gently, not pressuring him further. I wanted to know how I fit into his story, but at the same time, I didn't. I was afraid in a direct comparison, I would be the one coming up short.

"No, you are most certainly not." His brow furrowed as he lost himself in thought. I waited patiently; this wasn't going to be a brief conversation.

Finally, he started to tell me who Steve Rogers was, starting with when he first started trying to enlist in the army. His voice was wonderfully rich and deep. The cadence of his words was different from modern speech and his phrasing was more similar to that of my favorite classic novels than everyday conversation. It took a while for him to get it all into words; even then, I got the sense that he was telling me more than I was meant to hear. I listened attentively, committing his words to memory because I didn't think I would ever hear him tell this story again.

The sheer amount of obstacles pre-serum Steve Rogers had to overcome to even make it to becoming Captain America, scratch that - to make it to adulthood - was astounding; the fact that these impediments never broke his spirit, even more so. There was a reason the nation adored him. He was a living legend, an embodiment of America's fighting spirit and determination.

I finished my drink and sat the empty glass on the coffee table. The AC had brought down the temp enough for me to be cold now, so I just grabbed a blanket from the arm of the sofa behind me and wrapped it around myself, not wanting to disturb Steve. If he stopped now, he might never finish this story. 

I heard the anguish in his voice as he told me about how he'd lost his best friend to a Hydra attack. I was sure that Bucky's death was part of the reason why he didn't try to find another alternative to crashing that plane only days later. He'd promised Bucky that they'd be together until the end of the line; but Steve had missed his stop. I knew he regretted not having closure with Peggy, but the survivor's guilt he felt was even stronger than that. Pre-serum Steve must have had an incredibly strong sense of duty for it to have been amplified like that.

"And the next thing I remember is waking up in this time. They tried to make my recovery room seem like I was still in the 40's, but there were a couple of things that were just, I don't know, off, I guess. I broke out, running into the streets to Times Square, and that's when I met Nick Fury."

"And started saving the world all over again." I finished for him, "But this time from aliens."

Steve nodded. I got up and grabbed a couple bottles of water and turned off the AC. When I got back into the living room, Steve was holding my blanket, looking at it with a bemused expression. I handed him a bottle of water and he shot me a grin. I looked at my blanket and burst out laughing when I realized it was my ratty old Captain America one from when I was a kid. My best friend, Jace, was a huge Cap fan and always got me something Cap themed for my birthday.

"Not trying to make this even weirder, but you should know you were my favorite hero when I was a kid, Steve. You're part of the reason I wanted to join Shield." 

His laugh was a little rusty, but it was a real laugh. He finished the water quickly as I settled the blanket around my shoulders again and let my hair down to cover the goosebumps on my neck.

"Are you cold?"

A little. The thermostat's broke, so I'll have to tell Mr. Jones tomorrow so he can get it fixed."

Steve's POV

I opened my arms invitingly, knowing I put off a good deal of heat as high as my metabolism was. "Come here, Sarah; I'm like a heater."

She thought about that for a second, studying me briefly before moving closer to me, letting me put my arm around her as we sat next to each other. I needed this physical contact right now more than anything else but I wasn't sure if it was acceptable to ask for it. 

Emotionally, I knew I was barely keeping it together right now. I hadn't just told my story; I had relived it -every painful part of it - including losing my best friend all over again. I missed my old life more now than I ever had, not just Bucky, but Peggy, too. In the months since I'd been thawed, I still hadn't come to grips with the fact that neither of them were going to show up out of the blue. Talking to Sarah had brought up even more memories, both good and bad. 

I struggled to control my breathing, trying not to give in to my grief, but I was losing that battle. I knew I should leave; I wasn't in control of myself right now and I was worried that I would say something I shouldn't. Ever since the first day I'd met her, the dreams had been more vivid – and not in a good way. 

Distantly, I felt Peggy – or was it Sarah – I wasn't sure anymore; I couldn't tell them apart right now, working herself up into my lap, putting her arms around my neck and holding me tight. I instantly responded to the hug, folding my large frame around her small one, pulling her closer. I hid my face in her long, dark hair.

"Steve, I'm here for you. It's okay to cry. I'm here. It's okay." She murmured quietly, over and over, as my whole body shook from the effort of holding back. Her voice broke when she started to cry, her hot tears soaking the collar of my thin shirt and I lost the fight myself, tears streaming down my face as I held her slight frame even closer. 

I don't know how long we stayed that way, with me holding on to her like she was my lifeline, but when I finally stopped shuddering and my body relaxed, her hair was damp from my tears. 

She raised her head from my shoulder, pulling back so she could see my face. Her eyes were red and there were still tears on her cheeks. I used the pads of my thumbs to wipe them away as her sad golden brown eyes focused on mine, leaning her cheek into my palm and closing her eyes briefly and covering my hand with her own.

I'd never had anyone act like this around me, like they wanted me to touch them. Her small hands were gentle as she returned the favor, wiping away the remainder of my tears. I felt her shift in an attempt to get comfortable, and I realized how cramped of a position she had to have been in the entire time I'd been holding her.

I shifted on the couch so she would be more comfortable, and she pushed me into a semi reclining position. She sighed quietly as she stretched out on top of me, hiding a wince as she rubbed at a muscle that protested being balled up for as long as she'd been.

"Steve?" she whispered, resting her head on my chest, her ear over my heart.

"Sarah?" I said, just as quietly.

"What are you thinking?"

I didn't answer her right away, just rubbed my hands absently up and down her back, soothing another twitching muscle. Eventually, she braced herself on her forearms so she could look at me and I decided it was time to talk about what had really been on my mind since our last conversation at Shield earlier this afternoon.

"I'm glad... you look like Peggy, the Peggy I left behind in 1945. I know you're not her, but I'm still happy to see you and talk to you and get to know you.... She's still alive, you know."

She nodded, licking her lips before speaking. "I don't want to make you sad, Steve." I shook my head, opening my mouth to reply but she doggedly continued on. "I don't want to hurt you, so if my being here is going to make things harder for you in any way, you need to let me know that now."

I was finding it hard to breathe, panic gripping my heart and freezing me to the core. I knew she was going to try to leave me and I didn't want that to happen, not again. Her eyes flicked away from mine and I put a finger under her chin so she would look back at me again, needing that contact while she spoke. 

"It's not fair to keep shoving your loss in your face every day. I can't expect you to work with me on a daily basis when you can't even look at me without thinking of Peggy. I meant what I said in Maria's office today. Not sure how or why you heard that earlier, but I'm completely serious. If you want me to move, I'll do it. I still have boxes I haven't even unpacked yet, so it wouldn't be a problem."

"No!" I almost shouted, startling her. "No, don't leave! I don't want you to move." My voice was shaky, and I hoped she couldn't hear how it bordered on panicked in tone. My hands framed her face so she couldn't look away from me. "I don't think I could take it if you...disappeared...from my life right now. I – I don't." My voice cracked as I acknowledged exactly how painful that would be to me. "It would be like losing Peggy all over again...and even though I'm just starting to get to know you...it's gonna hurt like hell if I lose you, too, Sarah." 

My hand brushed the unruly curls out of her face, tucking them behind her ears. She stared at me for a long moment before bringing her hand up to my face, running it down the side, feeling the firm plane of my jaw. I savored the small affection, turning my face into her hand and covering it with my own. I wrapped my other arm around her, pressing her tight to me.

"I don't understand how this has happened, but I feel like I've been given a second chance."

"A second chance for what, Steve?" My eyes held hers as I tried to read their clear depths. I swallowed hard before I could continue.

"A second chance to be happy," I said, watching her lips part in surprise. "I can't remember the last time I was truly happy."

She blinked rapidly and I raised herself up so our faces were millimeters apart. I felt her warm breath on my face as my heart rate increased suddenly. She ran her thumb over my cheekbone gently, stroking my face with the palm of her hand, the sensation unfamiliar but pleasant. She blinked rapidly, lips partly slightly. "In the end, Steve, we only regret the chances we don't take."

"I'm not going to make that mistake again." I softly pressed my lips to hers, feeling her inhale sharply at the contact, but tentatively kissing me back. My fingers tangled in her long, soft hair as she gently moved her lips with mine. 

I'd never been kissed like this – so hesitantly. Her lips were warm and firm beneath mine as I led, teasing her with my tongue. She made a small noise in surprise, opening for me as I deepened the kiss. My hands ran down her back, holding her tightly to me.

I tasted peppers, rum and that intoxicating spice that's Sarah. Eventually, she pulled back and tucked her head into the crook of my neck. I turned into her, breathing in her light floral scent. I savored the feel of her in my arms as our pulses slowed and our breathing became normal again, my long fingers playing with her auburn tresses.

"So soft," I murmured, kissing the top of her head. "So beautiful." She raised her head back up to look at me, and I committed her beatific smile to memory. 

"Wow," she grinned. "So not what I thought was going to happen when you showed up tonight, but I'll take it."

"I can't say I planned this, either. I was just terrified that you were going to run away and leave me thinking I'd only imagined you."

"I just don't want to hurt you. You've been through enough already."

"You won't."

"Would you tell me if I did? I'm only human, Steve. I get mad and say stuff I shouldn't..."

I cut her off with a kiss. "I'll try," I vowed. "I'm only human, too." 

"And a very nice human you are." Sarah patted my chest with a grin and I snorted at her adorable goofiness. 

She moved to get off of me, but I wasn't cooperating - my arms didn't want to release her. "I'll be right back, I promise," she said as she met my eyes slowly untangling herself from me.


	5. Second Chances

Sarah's POV  
I stumbled into the bathroom, taking a chance to mentally catch my breath and wash the traces of my earlier tears from my face. My crazy hair I couldn't do much about, so I ran my brush through it and pulled it back into a ponytail again. I really wanted a shower, but I didn't think that Steve would stay put while I did that. 

We still had to finish our talk; some things were going to need to be thought about if we were going to be able to work together. I wouldn't deny that I was attracted to him; ironically, I had admired Captain America long before I'd ever met him. But Steve Rogers, the little guy from Brooklyn that never ran from a fight, was honestly who I wanted to get to know. While I thought he deserved to have a chance at happiness just like everyone else, I just wasn't sure it would be wise to get involved with a coworker - especially a famous one. 

I walked back to the couch where Steve was laying just as I'd left him, stretched out with his feet hanging off the other end, staring at the ceiling with his hands behind his head. I took a long drink of water and then looked at him, making up my mind quickly. I was willing to see where this would lead, but I wasn't ready for commitment just yet. 

I crawled back up on Steve and made myself comfortable. Hesitantly, he wrapped his arms around me as I braced myself on his chest to look at him.

I was just opening my mouth to speak when my phone buzzed on the coffee table, breaking the moment, and I reached over to see who it was.

Jace Barnes' picture and name flashed on the screen. I had just talked to him a couple days ago, but if I ignored his call he'd blow my phone up until I answered. I glanced over at Steve apologetically, showing him the screen.

"Sorry, Steve. I have to take this call. He's my best friend, and he'll just keep calling if I don't answer."

* * *

Steve's POV

I nodded, and I don't really know what Sarah saw on my face. It felt like I'd just gotten sucker punched. That picture on her phone...the hair was different and the clothes were wrong, but I swear that it could have been a picture of Bucky when we were younger. I wasn't prepared to see his face just then, guilt for not being able to save him pounding at me again.

Sarah stood up so she could move around. "Hey Jace, what's up?" I heard her say as she went into the kitchen with our water glasses. I went the bathroom and splashed water my face; I looked like I needed a good nights sleep, but otherwise looked fine. 

I went back into the living room and sat down as I heard her end her call and walk back into the room. "See you Saturday. Bye." She came to sit next to me.

"Who was that, Sarah?" My voice sounded odd even to my own ears. She looked at me curiously and then tapped her phone to show me some pictures. 

"This is Jace Barnes; he's been one of my best friends since we were kids." She tapped on a picture of three people laughing with their arms around each other and it got bigger. She handed me her phone as she pointed to the other people. "That's Jace there and the other person is Chloe Turner. She's like a sister to me."

"Barnes?" I asked, looking over at her.

Sarah nodded, her eyes searching my face. "Yes. What are you thinking, Steve?"

I handed her back her phone and pulled mine out my pocket. A couple of taps later, I showed her a picture of Bucky. It was one that Natasha found for me; this one was a formal service picture of Bucky before he got shipped out to Europe. She put the phones side by side.

"Who's this? He looks a lot like Jace."

"That's Bucky. James Buchanan Barnes was his full name."

Her eyes widened as she looked at me and I didn't remember telling her Bucky's full name at any time during my story. Her eyes looked at the photos again; it only took her a moment to put two and two together. 

"They have to be related. Did Bucky have siblings?"

I nodded and thought for a minute. "He had a sister, Rebecca, and two brothers, but they were quite a bit younger than we were. They might have all been in school by the time Bucky shipped out."

"Can I send this picture to myself?" she asked. I blinked at her in confusion, not sure what she was saying.

"I'll show you, okay?" She explained what she was doing as she clicked on things to add herself into my contacts, sent a text, and airdropped the photo. Then she took her phone and added me into her contacts, startling me when she told me to say 'cheese' and took my picture for her contacts. 

I chuckled when she showed me. "But I don't have one of you." I opened my contacts when she gave my phone back and told me what to hit, grinning for me as the flash went off. I glanced at the photo of a beautiful girl smiling big enough you could see her dimples; it had captured her essence pretty well. 

She typed a message and then waited for a response, which came sooner than I thought it would.

"Good thing you're already sitting down, because you're not going to believe this, Steve! Your buddy Bucky is Jace's great uncle. His father, Roger, was the son of Bucky's youngest brother, John."

I closed my eyes and absorbed that message. Bucky had family; he should have been there to grow old with Becky and his brothers. He would have been if I hadn't failed him.

Sarah touched my arm gently. "Would you like to meet Jace?" 

I thought about it for a minute and then nodded. "Yes. I'd like that."

"Come home with me to Jersey this weekend, then. It's my friends' high school graduation Saturday. I'm sure they won't mind."

I was surprised at the mental leaps this girl made. "Are you sure? Your parents would be okay with that?"

"We've got a spare room and I know my parents will love you, Steve. Truly, it'll be fine." She grinned for a moment, but then her face fell, "If you have plans already, though, we can go another day. I don't know what you have going on right now."

I took her hand in mine and put one finger on her lips to keep her from overthinking it. I knew I didn't have anything planned this weekend; I never did. "Shh," I smiled at her. "I would love to meet your friends and your parents, Sarah."

"Okay," she said with a smile, looking at me with a slightly raised eyebrow. "Do you want to watch a movie with me tonight? It's not too late for that."

"Sure. I'm still trying to get caught up on everything I missed."

"You pick the movie and I'll make the popcorn after I shower. Do you know how to run Netflix?" She asked as she picked up the remote control from the coffee table, bursting into laughter at my confused expression. "I'll take that as a no, then."

* * *

Sarah's POV

I felt sweaty and disgusting, so I brought some pj's into the bathroom with me, soft shorts and a fitted tank top, and got in the shower. The warm water felt wonderful as I lathered up and washed today's stresses away. I finally got out and dried off, brushed through my tangled mane, pulling it up in a messy bun, and brushed my teeth. I got dressed and went out to the living room to check on Steve. He'd found 'my list' and was scrolling through it, reading the short blurbs for each movie. 

I went in the kitchen and put some microwave popcorn in to cook while I quickly scrubbed the dishes and left them to dry. I wiped down the table and counter and hung the rag up to dry as the microwave dinged. I poured the popcorn into a large bowl and hit the kitchen lights on the way to the living room. 

I set the alarm on my phone for 6 AM and plugged Steve's phone in to charge; I had noticed earlier that the battery was pretty low. Mine was fine for a while yet. Good thing we had the same kind of phone. It made explaining things to him so much easier. 

I looked up to see that Steve had stopped on a chic flick I had been wanting to see for a while, The Fault in Our Stars. Chloe had said it was incredible – and sad. Pretty sure I wasn't up for more tears right now. "We can watch that if you want, but I think it's a sad one," I warned.

"Maybe another day." He handed me the remote and went to refill his water glass. I scrolled up to the comedy tab and clicked on the first Disney movie I found- The Emperor's New Groove. Can't go wrong with Disney- and it was one of my favorites. Steve turned off the living room lights and settled back on the couch, ready to relax. I hit play and grabbed the popcorn bowl, ditching the remote and scooting over next to him so I could share with him. 

We contentedly watched the movie, munching on handfuls of popcorn occasionally. It wasn't long before we polished off the popcorn and I set the bowl on the coffee table. 

I think we both must have drifted off because I woke up at 2AM from overheating. At some point, Steve had pulled me onto his lap and wrapped his arms around me. My TV had turned off from inactivity, so we must have been asleep for a while. Steve wasn't kidding, he really was like a furnace. He was still sound asleep as I carefully wriggled my way off of his lap.

I still couldn't believe what a crazy day it had been. I went to plug in my phone in my bedroom and get a drink. Steve was still sleeping but looked uncomfortable scrunched up on my small couch. I figured I could wake him up long enough to get him to bed. I still didn't think he should be alone yet. The events of today, combined with reliving his story had hit him hard emotionally. 

"Steve," I whispered quietly, not wanting to startle him. I gently shook his shoulder, warily standing back far enough I should be able to move if he took a swing at me. Some guys woke up like that if they were in a strange place; I knew enough cadets that did that if you woke them suddenly at Academy.

It was a good thing I was prepared, too, since he sat bolt upright and his fist came flying. I dodged most of the blow but he still clipped my cheek. Judging from the sting, I was going to have a bruise in the morning. 

"Jeez, Steve! Next time I'll let you get a sore back from sleeping on the couch."

"Peg-Sarah? Are you okay?"

 

* * *

Steve's POV

"It's my fault for startling you awake. Come on, let's go to bed." Sarah said as I started to get up from the couch. I'd been so deeply asleep I wasn't sure where I was. I froze when my overtired brain comprehended what she was saying. My hand came up to her face and I saw her try not to flinch when I gently ran my fingers over her cheek. I needed to see how bad it was, I couldn't tell if it was bruised or if that was just the way the shadows fell across her face, so I took a step back and flicked the light switch.

"Bright light," she grumbled, covering her eyes at the unexpected brightness. I pulled her hands from her face, revulsion filling me as I traced the outline of the bruise that was already starting to form. I hadn't broken anything, but I'd hit her pretty hard.

"I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you."

"It was an accident." She said as she stepped closer, putting her hand on my shoulder as I removed my hand from her. 

"That's no excuse for hitting you. Thank God you weren't any closer to me or I might have broken your cheekbone. I should go." I tried to turn away from her but she wouldn't allow me to, her arms winding around my neck.

"Steve, look at me." I met her eyes unwillingly, afraid of what I would see there. "I shouldn't have tried to wake you, but you looked so uncomfortable. I knew there was a possibility that you would wake up swinging. My buddy Jace wakes up with a knife in his hands. I was pretty far back; you're just faster than I anticipated, okay?"

I nodded, gently removing her hands from me so I could leave. I should go back to my apartment so she could get some sleep. 

"Don't go," she said, putting herself in my path again. "Please?"

"I shouldn't stayed," I said quietly, "I didn't mean to fall asleep."

"Steve, correct me if I'm wrong, but that's the quietest you've been when you've slept for the past two weeks. No nightmares?"

My eyes found hers again, confused. How did she know I had nightmares? 

"I'm a light sleeper," she said, her teeth worrying her bottom lip for a moment before continuing. "And the walls are pretty thin between our apartments; I'm pretty sure your bedroom and mine share a wall."

I felt my face flush as I processed what she was saying. I generally tossed and turned for most of the night, if I went to bed. I usually ended up sleeping on the floor, still not used to sleeping in a bed after almost two months. When I did sleep, my dreams were so vivid, it was like I was watching a movie – a horror movie – as I watched everyone I cared about die all over again. I huffed out a breath and ran a hand over my face, ashamed that she'd been hearing that.

"Look, Steve," Sarah said, taking my hand from my face and squeezing it. "We're both tired and it's been a long couple of days. I need sleep, you need sleep, and I'm no expert, but right now I don't think you should be alone, so will you please stay with me?"

I nodded, finally understanding what she was offering: a way to keep the nightmares at bay – for both of us. I wasn't the only one who had them; I'd heard her cry out at night sometimes. She reached over and hit the lights, pulling me with her to her bedroom. I halted before reaching the bed, not sure I should really be in her bedroom.

"I can sleep on the couch, Sarah." 

She sighed and turned to me, putting her arms around my torso and hugging me. I almost smiled when I realized she couldn't get her arms all the way around me, but I didn't. I put my arms around her, feeling the way she relaxed into me and starting to relax myself. 

"Just sleep, nothing more, Steve. There's still a couple hours before we need to be up for the day."

"Okay."

I let go of her so she could slide in under the covers; exhaling loudly, I sat down on the bed and removed my shoes, the bed dipping under my weight. I stretched out on top of the covers, rolling so I could face Sarah. I let her rest her head on my shoulder, thinking how good this felt to have her in my arms as I gently stroked her soft hair. It didn't take her long to fall asleep. I pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead and let sleep take me.

 

* * *

Sarah's POV

6 AM came sooner that I expected, my alarm startling me awake. I try to reach my phone, but I can't move because something warm and heavy is laying on me. It took me a minute to remember back to earlier this morning and I finally realize we must have rolled over in our sleep and it's Steve crushing me. I feel him move as the alarm crescendos and I suck in a deep breath as the weight is lifted off of me. 

"Good lord, Steve! What do you weigh?" I wheezed, reaching over to hit snooze because I didn't trust myself to get up yet. I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and rolled back over to look at Steve, who was incredibly handsome with morning bedhead and stubble on his face. 

"220. Why?"

"Apparently my lungs weren't ready for the 85 pound difference this morning."

"Sorry." He smiled softly at me and went to brush my unruly hair out of the way of his view. I watched his grin fade as he saw the bruise again in the weak light shining through my windows. 

"It'll be fine. It was an accident." I covered his hand with my own and kissed his palm, letting him pull me closer to him so my head was on his chest. I struggled to move, trying to get comfortable, only to look down and figure out why I'm having issues.

"Steve, are you laying on top of the covers?"

A slow smile spread across his face and I burst out laughing. You can take the man out of the 40's but you can't take the 40's out of the man. I sat up and liberated myself from the covers' tenacious grasp, stretching out for a moment before laying back down on him.

"Did you sleep well?"

"Yeah," I yawned. "You?"

He stroked my hair gently. "Yeah. That was the best I've slept in a long time. Thank you."

"For what?"

"For insisting I stay here with you last night."

"I'm glad you did, Steve; you've had a lot to deal with since you thawed. Sometimes it's easier if you're not always alone."

"I've been on my own since I was your age, Sarah. I don't know any other way."

"What about your friends?" 

"The team?"

"Don't you have other friends – ones not on the team?"

"Not really. I go to work, I go on missions, I come home. Everyone I knew before is either really old or gone."

"So are we friends, or am I just part of your team?" 

"I don't know, but this seems like more than 'just friends' to me. I haven't really had much experience with women." His cheeks flushed slightly at an admission that really didn't surprise me.

"Me either." His eyes widened and I laughed. "I mean, I haven't ever really dated anyone. I was too busy trying to become a Shield Agent." 

"I find that hard to believe. Are men today blind?" he scoffed.

"No, but when they find out how old I am, they tend to back off. Being able to kick their butt also tends to...intimidate them...I guess. I've just never found anyone my age I was interested in getting to know better than just as a friend. I have plenty of male friends, but that's all they are."

"Your age doesn't bother me, Sarah. I just don't know what dating entails in this time. I don't know what's acceptable and what not." 

"Fair enough. Dating is kind of a big leap for someone you've only really known for a day – and I'm not ready for that, but I am interested in you."

"What does 'interested' mean?"

"That we'd like to get to know each other better before dating. But it's not exclusive; if you find someone you like better, you're free to pursue them." His arms tightened around me and I could tell he didn't like that explanation. I dropped a placating kiss on his lips.

"So kissing is allowed?" He smiled.

"Yeah, kissing is allowed," I rolled my eyes, this had to be the strangest conversation I had ever had. "Respectful touching is allowed – if you slap my ass so help me God I will punch you – not that I think you will, but consider yourself warned."

Steve chuckled. "I take it that is what is called a 'pet peeve'?"

"Hah. How would you like it if every female you met came up, copped a feel and expected you to take it as a compliment?"

His face flushed and he shifted uncomfortably. "I will never understand why modern society thinks that things like that are okay."

"Had that happen a time or two?"

"Yeah. Not recently, thank goodness."

"Anyway, the whole idea is to spend time with a person by hanging out and doing stuff together to decide if you feel something for them or not. If you do, you start dating. If you don't – then friends it is."

"So do I need to tell the team anything?"

"Not unless you think they need to know. You know them better than I do; I just don't want Natasha as an enemy." I grinned, not thinking he would take me seriously.

"There is nothing between me and Natasha," Steve raised his eyebrows, confused by my train of thought.

"Keep telling yourself that, Steve." I laughed. "I'm not getting in the middle of you two."


	6. Training Day

Sarah's POV

In no time at all, we pulled up to the Triskelion, scanned our badges and were waved right through. Steve pulled into his reserved spot in the main garage and we climbed off. I gave him the helmet to stow away and he reached for my hand as we walk inside. I wasn't sure if I wanted everyone at Shield to know we were together, not with me being so new to the team and to the Triskelion. 

Luckily my phone vibrated just then and I gently tugged my hand back, smiling apologetically as I dug in my pocket for my buzzing phone and sent a response as we walked to the elevator. I still had plenty of time to change into my catsuit and stop at my desk to check my email and grab my tablet and notes before opening the connecting door to Maria's office, only to find Steve already there, standing in front of her desk.

"Good morning Captain Rogers, Agent Hill." I trilled, turning back to Maria just in time to catch the amused glance she threw at a very flushed Steve, who was struggling to hide an appreciative smile.

"How do you like your new catsuits, Sarah? We made some minor modifications to the ones you used at Academy based on Agent Romanoff's recommendations. These ones are a lighter Kevlar weave with improved bulletproofing. It won't feel great if you get hit, but at least it shouldn't penetrate the suit. Captain Roger's new suit is also made of the same material."

I glanced over at Steve, who was wearing a tightly fitted dark navy blue stealth suit with his trademark white star and some white detailing. If anything, it made him even more attractive. Navy blue was a great color on him; it brought out the cobalt flecks in his eyes and made an excellent foil for his blond hair.

"Are you anticipating me jumping in front of bullets? I can assure you those I actively avoid." They laughed as I glanced down at my suit and inspected it closer. I was only looking at fit and mobility when I tried it on last week. I saw the clever pockets worked into the sleeves, the reinforced vambraces, and the hidden scabbards for various types of blades. 

"It's great. This one is much more comfortable than my previous ones! Looks like I can fit most of my knives in this one!" I grinned excitedly, almost bouncing in happiness. Maria stood up to lead us to the morning briefing and I fell in beside her. She handed me a new earpiece and I fit it in my ear.

"It seems that Tony had been playing with a new prototype and neglected to tell IT that yesterday's coms weren't fully tested yet," she said by way of explanation.

"Uh-huh. Well that explains the faulty transmissions. Is Mr. Stark still trialing those today?"

"Not that I know of." Her expression made me think that if Tony knew what was good for him, Maria would be informed from now on – she didn't like unnecessary surprises.

Finally everyone showed up and I was assigned to Natasha for training and outfitting for the upcoming mission. Maria and Fury were flying out for the rest of the day. Tony wasn't there today, but no one really seemed surprised; he did have a business to run after all.

I followed Natasha, Clint and Steve to the training room. No one else raised an eyebrow at my catsuit; Natasha wore hers most of the time and I saw a lot of other female agents wearing them as we got closer to the training rooms.

Natasha let us into a large well lit studio. I walked around to check it out and started stretching while I strolled. Finding a stereo in the corner, I synced my phone to it and pulled up my workout playlist to get my mind in the game.

I moved over by the mirrors, using the barre to stretch my legs. I heard the music start and started into my favorite warm-up routine. Ballet flowed to capoeira to a random mix of other styles designed to efficiently warm up all of my muscles in turn. After about ten minutes, the music stopped and I sank into a split and moved into my stationary stretches. I looked around and the others were just standing there watching me, including Tony, who I hadn't noticed come in. Steve and Tony were watching me closely, but Clint was focused on Natasha. I kinda got the impression they were more than 'just friends.'

"Ready," I told Natasha, standing up and bouncing over to her. "What're the rules today?"

"No weapons today, only hands." She gestured at the pile of weapons she had pulled out of her catsuit and I made a smaller pile nearby. I hadn't taken the time to figure out where all my stuff would go yet, so I didn't have much in it in this suit yet.

We moved into position and nodded, smoothly rolling into a pattern of punch, block, kick, repeat. It took a bit for me to analyze her fight pattern, but when I was ready, I moved out of defense and took the offense, picking up the pace little by little until we were both going at top speed. I could tell I had surprised her with my abilities when she could barely get her blocks up fast enough to keep me from landing a solid hit. 

I backed down slightly, letting her take the lead again, content to just dance with her for a while longer, enjoying the challenge. It had been a while since I'd found anyone that could tolerate a good sparring for very long. We went at it for a long time, until I we were both starting to get tired, and I had an opening to end it, tossing her down to land on her, hand on her throat. Natasha conceded and I pulled her to her feet.

"Wow," she panted. "That was different."

"I enjoyed that, Agent Romanoff." I said, shaking my muscles out. "You lasted longer than I thought you would." I grinned when she raised her eyebrows. "I've been doing this since I was five. I ran out of training partners by the time I joined Shield, so I helped build the holo-trainer so I could keep improving." 

"Do you dance?"

"Of course. I like all kinds of dance, but my fav is ballet."

Natasha had a speculative look on her face as she turned and walked over to Steve. I was ready for more, so I looked around. "Who's next?"

 

* * *

Steve's POV

"My turn," said Clint, tossing Sarah a staff. "Let's see how you do with this."

"I like big sticks and I can not lie," she sang and I heard Clint laugh as she twirled her staff; he clearly knew the reference.

"It's paraphrased from a song that was popular in the 90's," murmured Natasha as we watched them spar. I hummed in response.

Clint had a different style than Natasha, so I could see that Sarah was taking her time on the first couple hits, assessing him. A sparring contest was a beautiful thing to watch when the combatants could respond to each other instinctively. Watching Sarah and Natasha spar had been like watching a carefully choreographed ballet. This was more like ballroom dancing, no less elegant but serving a different purpose. 

As we watched, I noticed she was content with letting Clint lead until she knew he was adequately warmed up. Once he was moving as fluidly as he normally did in a fight, she started to push back at him, driving him to defense and trying to make him angry. His strikes became a little more sloppy when she let him go back to attacking, but there was no doubt in my mind that she was in complete control of this match. As he grew tired, there were plenty of openings for her to knock him off his feet and end it, which she finally did, staff resting on his neck. She relaxed and pulled him to his feet, clapping him on his back.

"Thanks, Agent Barton; that was great! Can we do that again sometime?"

"Call me Clint, Agent Evans." He groaned as he stretched out. "Sure kid; next time it's my turn to win, though."

"Sarah is fine with me, Clint. We'll see about that – you gotta earn it!" She gave him a huge grin and I watched him shake his head slightly to pull himself out of his daze.

She turned to me and Tony. "Next?"

Tony smirked. "Boxing?"

"Sure. Haven't done it in a while but it'll come back to me."

"All right. Give me few to go get my gear. You got any here?"

"No, it's still packed up from my move. I'm sure there is an equipment room around here somewhere, though." She turned to Natasha, who nodded and waved Stark off and they left the room together.

 

* * *

Sarah's POV

"You got a death wish, Evans?" Natasha asked as we walked to the locker room on the Avengers floor.

"No, just enjoy a good workout. Hitting the sandbag isn't quite the same as a real bout. Any special rules you use here?"

"Only with Tony. He has a miniature electromagnetic arc-reactor in his chest, so no heart shots on him. He usually wears extra padding just in case."

"Okay then." I stared at her, wide eyed. "So he has an arc-reactor...In his chest? Why?"

"He got hit by some shrapnel in Afghanistan a little over a year ago. The arc-reactor keeps the metal from tearing up his heart, among other things."

Natasha lead me to a small equipment room and dug out some gear for me while I stripped out of my catsuit. The Kevlar weave would absorb most of the impact of my opponent's blows, so I was glad I wore tight jogging capris and a tank top under it. I had already worked up a good sweat, but I knew I would be soaked when I got out of the ring, so I washed off my make up and tamed back my hair again. I glanced in the mirror and saw Natasha looking at the now colorful bruise on my cheek. By now, I could have blamed it on a stray hit, but she knew as well as I did that neither Avenger had landed that solid of a hit on me.

"That's a pretty nasty bruise there, Evans."

"Yeah, shit happens. Yesterday just wasn't my day."

Natasha grabbed my chin and looked my face over, running her thumbs over my cheeks to make sure nothing was broken. I allowed it mainly because it was a valid concern; I was getting ready to go a couple rounds with a man that outweighed me by a solid 40 pounds. Satisfied, she released me and we walked back to the ring. Tony wasn't there yet, so I sat down and started wrapping my fists. I was just about done when Steve and Clint walked in with a couple water bottles. Steve made straight for me, an enigmatic expression on his face. His hand reached out to gently brush his fingertips over the bruise, eyes darkening. 

"I'm sorry, Sarah." He said quietly. "It looks even worse now than it did last night."

"It's okay, Steve." I took his hand in mine. "I'll be fine. Would you check my wraps for me?" He looked them over and helped me pull on my headgear and gloves. I looked up to see Natasha giving Steve a considering look. "You'd better talk to her soon; she's getting suspicious."

"Let her wonder. It's good for her to not know everything every now and again," he grinned.

The door opened again and Tony came in, ready for gloves. Clint laced him up as I hopped in the ring, warming back up again. I could see the bright blue glow coming from the center of his chest through his wife beater.

"Who's reffing?" I asked, not seeing anyone else moving to get in the ring. I didn't need a referee per se, but I didn't mind one.

"Jarvis, say hello to Agent Evans."

"Hello again, Sarah." His British tones came from the speaker in the ceiling.

"Hey Jarvis, I've missed you." I beamed at Tony, knowing Jarvis was linked into the rooms surveillance cameras.

"How do you know Jarvis, Agent?" ask Tony, astounded.

"I was on the team that helped create Fury's AI. You were gone, so Jarvis walked us through a rather tricky configuration. Ms. Potts said that was probably the best way to do it. You ready, Mr. Stark?"

"Call me Tony, Agent. And yes, I'm ready."

"Rules, Jarvis?"

"Four rounds, three minutes each, standard USA boxing rules with the precautionary addition of no heart shots on Mr. Stark."

"Thanks J." I slipped my mouthpiece in and bounced to the middle of the ring, holding out my right glove to meet Tony's. Someone rang the bell and we started the match. I spent a good part of the first round warming Tony up. At his age, he really should know better than to go in cold. I was also drawing Tony out to take his measure. It meant I had to move around a little more, but I enjoyed the exertion. He was a good match for me, considering that this was my third workout today. 

Tony packed a solid punch and he had no intention of going easy on me after seeing what I could do. I got in a couple of good hits, but so did Tony. The bell rang and I went to my corner to get a drink and wipe the sweat from my face. Clint and Natasha were enjoying the match and cheering Tony on, hoping they'd see me on my back, I guess. Steve watched quietly on the sidelines, taking it all in. I knew he wasn't liking seeing us really go at it, but I hoped after seeing the first two matches he would have a little more confidence in me.

Round 2 started and I figured if I was going to win this one I had better step up my game, so I took the lead and started making Tony work for his points. By the end of the round, I was up by one and convinced Clint and Natasha had money riding on this match. I was wearing Tony down, so if I kept at it I'd be in the clear. 

I came out strong at the start of the 3rd round and started a series of fast taps that left me an opening for a good uppercut to his jaw, sending him to the mat. Jarvis started the count, but it was pretty clear to me that Tony was done for the day. I pulled off my gloves and took out my mouth guard, then pulled him to his feet, a little alarmed when he leaned heavily on me as I led him to his corner.

"J- full scan," I called out.

"Mr. Stark is winded from the exertion. No major injuries detected."

"So there are minor ones." Only Tony could make a computer program so human-like it would make a distinction like that. 

"Only to my pride," Tony answered, making a quick gesture that Jarvis clearly understood as a command.

"You had me worried for a moment, Mr. Stark. I didn't hit you that hard." I let go of him and hopped out of the ring, taking off my headgear and pushing my hair back from my face. Clint slapped a twenty in Natasha's outstretched hand.

"You're welcome, Romanoff. Where's my cut?" I teased. 

"I'll buy you lunch tomorrow." 

"I'll take what I can get." I laughed, knowing lunch was going to be catered tomorrow for the meeting.

Tony finally got out of the ring and looked at me skeptically. "Do you know how hard you hit?"

I raised my eyebrows at him, "No. Never measured it. Why?"

"I'll bring her by the lab later, if it'll make you happy, Stark." Steve interjected, joining us. 

"Yes, Capsicle, it would."

"Capsicle? Really, Stark?" I snorted in disbelief, smirking at Tony.

"Call me Tony," he replied with a grin.

"Only if you'll call me Sarah." I shot back.

"Deal."

I paused before taking the wraps off my arms. I was pretty sure it was going to be a negative, but I still had to ask. "Well, Captain, wanna go a couple rounds? I'm good and warmed up now."

Steve shook his head. "We're out of time for now; maybe another day. Go get cleaned up and you're supposed to meet with Bruce in 20 minutes."

I nodded, grabbed my gear, and walked back to the locker room to strip down and look at myself in the mirror. My ribs had taken the worst of it and were now lightly speckled with red marks that would become bruises later; nothing serious. I showered quickly, washing off the worst of the sweat using the wall mounted soap dispensers. Not my favorite, but it'd do for now. 

I got out and dried off, wrapping my hair in a towel before going to pull on my damp sports bra and underwear - no way I was going commando in my catsuit. I made a mental note to bring some underclothes to keep in my locker for days like today. My tank top and capris were soaked, so I bundled them up and threw them in my locker. After a couple extra squirts of body spray, and a judicious reapplication of deodorant, I rolled my catsuit back on, tucking in the pile of weapons Natasha had grabbed for me while I was getting cleaning up.

I was just pulling on my boots when Natasha came back in to get me. I left my hair hang loose down my back so it could dry. Wet, it easily reached the middle of my back. I glanced in the mirror to make sure I was presentable and shut my locker on the way out. 

"You did well today, Evans. It's been a while since someone has knocked me on my back."

"Thanks, Agent Romanoff; you can call me Sarah, though." She nodded acceptance. "It was nice to let loose. I usually don't get to spar for that long unless I'm in the holo-trainer."

"So what's up with you and Rogers?"

"I plead the fifth! You gotta talk to him." I raised my hands defensively.

"Oh, trust me, I will." Her grin was hardly reassuring. "I can't wait to hear this one."

I groaned. "This must be what having a sister is like. Not that I would know, but this is what I assume it's like."

Natasha laughed quietly, "I like you." She swiped her key-card at a pad by a reinforced glass door. The door slid open and I followed her in. Dr. Banner looked at up from his work and waved us over.

"Good afternoon, Natasha, Agent Evans."

"Sarah's fine, Dr. Banner."

"Please call me Bruce then, Sarah. Fury wants a full lab panel on you before you begin active duty. Anything special we should know about?"

"It's all in my file." 

"Which is quite substantial considering your relative age." 

"Thanks, I think. You were the only one I thought would actually read it, you know. Which arm do want, Bruce?" I took the seat he gestured me towards and I unzipped the front of my suit so I could pull my arms out. He flushed and turned away as soon as he realized what I was doing, opening a drawer to gather supplies from.

"Your non-dominant arm is preferable."

I considered that for a moment. I was totally ambidextrous, but I used be right handed as a kid, so I pulled out my left arm for him. Bruce hesitated, so I said, "I can draw myself if you prefer, Bruce." I said as I smiled at him. "It's fine either way."

I wasn't sure what was bothering him. It's not like I was naked or anything; all the important parts were covered. Beside me, Natasha had opened a computer screen and was filling in basic information on me.

Bruce tourniqueted my arm and brushed the inside of my elbow with an alcohol pad. I positioned my arm and met his eyes. "It's a straight shot for that vein, just so you know. You won't get enough using your current angle."

He blinked at me in surprise, realigning the needle based on that premise. "Thank you, Sarah. I don't usually draw my own samples, but the lab staff are a little in awe of the team and I didn't want one of them to mess it up." Sure enough, he got it right away and started pulling. Releasing the tourniquet, he filled the syringe before individually spiking the half dozen cultured flasks he had ready. 

"I understand. There are some pretty big personalities on this team, after all."

Natasha fired basic questions at me that I answered easily. She tried to slip in one about Steve, but I didn't fall for it. Raising one eyebrow at her, she smirked and continued down the line. I knew that Shield already had this data, so I wondered why we were playing 20 questions.

Bruce finished drawing and put a piece of gauze over the puncture wound, which I held there until the wound sealed. He had been studying me while he drew my blood, so I wasn't surprised when he questioned me about my face. 

"Did you get this today, Sarah?" He shined a small light in my eyes and had me follow his finger to check if I had a concussion. His fingers were gentle as he probed my cheeks like Natasha had before my boxing match.

"Depends on what time today started, Bruce." He shot me an exasperated look and I rolled my eyes. "No, it's not from today's workouts."

I checked my arm, which had stopped bleeding and moved to put it back in my suit before he asked to see the bruises on my ribs. I knew none of them were cracked, but Natasha was clearly not on my side as she brought them to Bruce's attention.

"The bruises on her ribs are from today, Bruce. She went 3 rounds with Tony this morning - and won."

I hopped off the chair and made to put my arm away. "Traitor," I hissed under my breath. She heard me anyway and gave me an innocent look. 

"Step over here, please, Sarah." Bruce ordered before I could retreat. I sighed and dragged my feet over to where he was waiting. He tapped a couple keys and turned to me.

"Nothing's cracked or broken, Bruce. I'll be perfectly fine in a day or two." He ignored me and finished the sequence, focusing on the computer.

"Can you take your other arm out of your suit? This won't scan well through the Kevlar."

I sighed and took my other arm out of my sleeve and opened my suit to my hips, letting the sleeves fall behind me. I held my arms straight out from my body as a bio-med scan started up. Sure enough, all of my bruises lit up blue on the screen.

"See? Nothing broken. Am I done now? Do I get a sucker?" I grinned at Bruce who only shook his head.

"You're free from this scan. Don't run off, though, I'm not done with you yet. I might have a dinner mint somewhere, but don't hold your breath."

I snorted and pulled up my top to put it back on, just getting it zipped when Tony came in. I instantly ratted him out; if I had to get scanned, he did too. "You'd better scan Tony, Bruce. I'm pretty sure I cracked one of his ribs."

Tony sent me an irritated look since he knew what would happen next. Natasha gave me a high five and went back to firing questions with me. Tony at least got to keep his shirt on since he wasn't wearing armor, but it turned out that I did crack two of his ribs, though, much to his annoyance. 

"So how hard do you hit, kid?" Tony asked me again as he pulled his shirt off, wincing as the movement irritated his sore ribs. He wasn't in bad shape for a 40 year old guy. He had a decent build, on the lean side, more wiry than bulky. I visually studied the arc reactor in his chest and my hands itched with the need to touch it and figure out how it worked.

Bruce smeared some kind of ointment over Tony's ribs and was trying to wrap them up. I could see the wrap was too loose from where I was standing because Tony was unhelpfully slouching. I sidled over and poked him sharply in the lower back, startling him into straightening up. Sure enough, the wrap slid down his torso, undoing all of Bruce's work. 

"Don't know. Haven't got that far into 20 questions yet. Now stand up straight this time. It'll feel better if you do." I took the roll from Bruce and undid the wrap to start back over, deftly pulling him back into place.

"Done this a time or two?"

"Yup. My buddy Jace wanted to learn MMA with me when we were 14. I broke a couple of his ribs when we were practicing our moves. His mom would have killed us if she ever learned about that little adventure, so I had to do this every day for two weeks. He doesn't heal as fast as I do." I finished the wrap off and Bruce handed me a couple of those toothed pins to hold it in place. "All done."

I grabbed his shirt and tossed it over his head so he could get it on without moving too much. His eyes met mine as I held the shirt in place while he pushed him arms into the sleeves. I could tell when he noticed the bruise on my face. My headgear had covered most of it earlier, so I guess he hadn't seen it until just now.

"Did I do that?" He didn't touch me, but I could tell he wanted to. 

"No, I had that long before our match." I held his chocolate brown eyes with mine so he would know I was telling the truth. "I'm sorry about your ribs, Tony. I really didn't think I was using my whole swing on you; I usually don't."

"Wait, what? Sarah, were you holding back on me?" 

I didn't answer, but my flushed cheeks gave me away. 

"I can't believe you weren't even really trying!" he exclaimed.

I turned away from Tony, intending to go back to 20 questions with Natasha - that was less likely to be embarrassing - only to see them all looking at me curiously.

"You didn't even really break a sweat taking down me and Clint, and I know you could have won both those matches quite a bit faster than you did. You were on your third workout of the day when you went up against Tony."

"What are you saying, Romanoff?" I didn't know what she was getting at, but she had to have a point in mind.

"I wonder how strong you really are, Evans. What would happen if you didn't hold back."

"People get hurt when I don't hold back. I don't like hurting people that don't deserve it."

"So in the holo-trainer-"

"I don't hold back. The holo's aren't real."

"You're going to be going on missions with us." Natasha was standing directly in front of me and I knew that she would take me out now if she thought I was a threat to the team. "We need to know exactly what you can do, Evans. We need to understand your fighting methods to work you in where you can have the most effect. I don't care what you are as long as we can trust you at our backs."

I looked around at everyone, meeting their eyes. Sometime in the past couple minutes Clint and Steve had entered the lab, just in time to hear Natasha's conversation with me.

"I know I'm new to this team, but I've got your backs. Fury and Maria wouldn't have brought me in if they thought it wasn't going to work. I'm not an Avenger; I was never intended to be one – you guys are the public face of Shield. My duty is to stand with you all and do the things that you guys can't be seen doing. You need a support crew you can trust." 

Clint nodded his agreement. He'd been with Fury and Hill long enough to not even question that statement. Natasha was a little harder to read, but she hadn't really tried to kill me yet, so I took that to be a positive sign.

"Pull everything on me you can find, Romanoff; I've got nothing to hide. I've been with Shield for 4 years; I'm a level 7 agent - you don't reach that without having proved yourself. I'm not asking you to trust me yet; I know that'll take time. I'm only asking for the chance earn that trust."

I turned to look at Bruce, who was watching me closely. "Bruce, I'm willing to do any test you have for me; I know what'll show up on a full genetic panel." He nodded, indicating the computer.

"Already running it. It's been a while since you've had one done."

The room was silent for a long moment and I turned to walk out the door. "Captain, at the end of the day, it's your call." I held his cobalt gaze with my own. "This is your team and if you don't think that I'll be an asset to it then speak up now or forever hold your peace. I'm going to get something to eat right now since I'm starving, but I'll be back in a bit - unless you all decide you don't want me to come back."


	7. 20 Questions

Sarah's POV  


I swiped my way into the lab a half hour later, unsure of my reception. Steve was clearly relieved I'd come back; Natasha had probably been interrogating him since I left. He came to stand in front of me. 

"What did you decide, Captain?"

"You're staying on this team," he said with a small smile. "Unanimous vote. So where did you go? You took off pretty fast."

"Just down to the cafeteria; I have a high metabolism and all that exercise made me hungry." I shrugged and went to go sit next to Bruce, who had pulled up my genetic panel results. The word 'Enhanced' was in the upper right corner. I pointed out a couple specific things for him to tag and left him to it. 

Tony had pulled up some of my holo-trainer footage and was watching it with Clint on a different screen. "So you can learn any fighting style just by watching it?" Clint asked distractedly.

"Yup, but I learn faster by doing. It takes me a couple hours sometimes, depending on how complicated it is. I had a lot of different teachers when I was younger."

I wandered over to where Natasha was tapping away at a holo. "So am I done with 20 questions yet?"

"Not even close," she grinned. "So spill it, Evans. What's between you and Rogers?"

"What's between you and Clint?"

"We're partners."

I raised one eyebrow, doubting the simplicity of that statement. "Talk to him."

"I did."

"Then we're good."

"You're not getting off that easy, Evans." She crooked her finger at Steve, who was watching us from across the room. He shook his head and she gave him a look. I guess he knew what that meant, so he made his way over to us.

"Yes?" He crossed his arms.

"I'm getting to the bottom of this now. What's between you and Evans?"

"Nothing."

If anything, Natasha's grin got wider. "Doesn't look like nothing to me."

"Why do you want to know?"

"Steve," she warned.

"Fine. We're just interested in getting to know each other better."

"You're a terrible liar, Steve."

"Tell me something I don't know." 

"Okay then. You better claim her before Tony tries to. I think he's got a soft spot for her."

Steve's jaw clenched and he shot Tony a dark look. Tony was studiously ignoring us, but I would bet my bottom dollar he was hanging on every word. Clint was smirking, so I made a rude sign at him, which made him laugh. 

"Yeah," I said. "It's called broken ribs."

"That's like saying you like him in man speak." Natasha switched to Russian.

"Sorry for my rustiness. But, yeah - no. Not into him; I can't compete with his mirror and he's old enough to be my dad." I replied in Russian.

"Ouch! Burn, baby. I can't deny the truth in that statement."

"You know, Steve's technically old enough to be your grandpa, right?>" Clint added, making me raise an eyebrow at him.

"Biologically, true. Physically, I'd put him as early twenties."

"So you like him then."

"What's not to like about him? He's the original nice guy." I shrugged. "Clark Kent's got nothing on him.".

Natasha laughed and switched back to English. "Damn Evans, glad you joined us."

"Thanks. It should be interesting."

How many languages do you speak? Signed Clint.

Dunno. Fluently or just enough to get by?

Both.

I thought for a minute as Clint and Tony joined us. Bruce looked up from his work to see what was happening now.

"Umm, about ten? I can read more dialects than I can speak."

"So ASL, Russian, what else?"

"French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Greek, Mandarin, German, and Arabic."

"Wow. Didn't know you were such an overachiever, Evans. Standard agents only know three on average," said Clint.

"I just wanted to know what people were saying about me," I gave him a pointed look and he smirked.

"I get why they picked you to come hang out with us. There's literally nothing you can't do, is there?"

"Rent a car, buy beer, and go to a casino." They all burst out laughing at my quick response. "Seriously, can't do any of those things; I just turned 18. Sometimes I even act like a normal teenager and get hangry like earlier."

"You're seriously only 18?" Tony asked. "So you joined Shield at 14? How does that even work?"

"How could it not? I was a super strong genius that wanted to work for them, so I made them see that it was better for me to be on their side than against them."

"You hacked my tower? That was you with the cute little message?"

"Guilty. Jarvis tell you?"

"No, but he should have," Tony stared at me for a moment. "I looked for you for months so I could offer you a job with Stark Industries. Offer still stands."

"He didn't know it was me, besides I'd be bored in a week." I grinned, "I like being an agent."

"I believe you now, and I still want to know how hard you hit when you're not holding back."

I sighed; he was like a dog with a bone. "Where's your holo-trainer at? Jarvis can measure force if he's wired in."

"This way," Bruce said. "I'd like to watch, if you don't mind, Sarah. I'm sorry I didn't come watch you training with the team earlier. I lost track of time."

"It's fine with me, Bruce. You didn't miss much."

"Says the girl who took down three Avengers today," snarked Clint.

"Well, I know I'd never be able to take Thor or Bruce and I'm pretty sure Cap's stronger than I am, so that's as many as I'm going to get."

"Never say never."

I snorted in disbelief. "Did you just quote Bieber to me, Barton?"

"Hell no! Fury made me sign a contract specifically promising not to injure or kill that annoying little prick."

I laughed at his perturbed expression as we walked into the holo-trainer. I walked to the center of the room while others went into the viewing booth.

"Tell me when you're ready, Stark." I pulled my hair back into a ponytail and stood at ease while I waited for the genius to plug Jarvis into the system.

"All right. Wow me, kid."

"Agent Sarah Evans access code 050594," I addressed the machine.

Voice print accepted. Resume last program used by Agent Evans? asked a male robotic voice.

"Affirmative. Maximum difficulty. Cue playlist 7."

Confirmed. Program will commence in 30 seconds.

I grinned to myself as I moved into ready position. I loved letting loose like this. My favorite song by Breaking Benjamin, I Will Not Bow, started up with the holographic images solidifying. They looked real, but my body would pass through them as I gave them death blows. A scoreboard kept count of targets neutralized and missed.

Ten minutes passed before the program ended. I was breathing heavily as I looked at the scoreboard. I had beat my previous record by 3, making it 124 killed and no misses. I let myself into the observation booth, smirking at Tony.

"Woo-hoo! New PR! Did you get what you needed, Stark?"

He was tapping at his phone, but looked over at me with a grin. "Yep. Sure did."

"Good." I said as we headed back to Bruce's lab. "Is is snack time yet?"

"I ordered pizza," said Clint. "It'll be here soon."

"And you're sharing, right?"

"I suppose I could. I ordered enough for everyone."

"Sweet. I love pizza! I'm going to go wash up and I'll meet you back at the lab."

When I came back, the pizza was over half gone and everyone was digging in. I grabbed a slice of supreme and went to go sit on a desk by Tony, who was sitting rigidly in a rolling chair. I could tell his ribs were bothering him and felt a little guilty for causing him pain.

"So Einstein, how hard do I hit?"

"3800 psi average."

"Wow. That's as much as Mike Tyson. How hard does Cap hit?"

"More, actually. Tyson topped out at 1800. Cap averages 8,000 to 9,000 psi." I whistled - that was a lot of force. "So how did you not seriously hurt anyone today during those workouts?"

"Years of practice. I did grow up as a normal American girl – for the most part, at least – you know. I knew I was stronger than everyone else, but they tended to avoid me when they found out that little detail. Add in being a genius who started college at 9 and had a couple PhD's by 14 and you might as well tattoo 'weirdo' on my forehead."

"I, of all people, can actually feel sympathy for you."

"Thanks, Tony. You're really not so bad, you know, when you're not being a diva."

"Was that a compliment, Evans? Say it again so I can record that first part."

"Oh, now I want to take it back."

"No can do."

I snorted and went to go get another piece of pizza. The supreme was all gone, so Hawaiian was my next favorite. I went to go perch on the desk next to Steve, who was lost in thought. I nudged him with my shoulder, startling him. "You're missing out. If you want more you better act fast; Clint's scarfing big time."

He gave me a slow smile and shook his head. "I've had enough already. Thanks, though."

"What'cha thinking? You looked pretty serious."

"Just thinking about you."

"What about me?"

"I've never seen anyone fight like that before. How did I get the drop on you?"

"Most of the time I dial myself down to act like a normal human. I know what I'm capable of, so I keep it under pretty firm control...and you're really fast. Do you ever use the holo-trainer?"

"No, Nat keeps trying to talk me into it, but I don't think I'm ready for that yet."

"You'd be surprised how good it feels to let loose. I bet you'd enjoy it once you got used to it. I can help customize it for you, if you'd like - or you could spar with me sometime. We never got around to it today."

"Maybe another day. I'm not sure I could hit you, though."

"I'm not sure you could again either...I'm pretty fast myself." I gave him a cheeky grin.

"That's not what I meant, Sarah."

"Then what did you mean?" I asked, looking up at him from under my lashes.

He reached his hand out and gently brushed it across my bruised cheek. "I don't want to hurt you, Sarah."

I took his hand in mine and twined my fingers with his. "This will be gone before tomorrow morning, Steve. I heal pretty quickly, which is probably a good thing considering my choice of profession." I could see the doubt in his eyes. "If it's gone by the time we leave tomorrow, will you spar with me? Pleeeeease?" I begged shamelessly.

"If it's really gone, not hidden like it was this morning, I promise to consider it."

"Yay!" I let go of his hand and hugged his arm. "I can't wait!" He laughed at my enthusiasm.

Natasha stopped in front of us with the last box of pizza, offering it to us. "Can't wait for what?"

I went to reply only to find a large warm hand covering my mouth and pulling me up against a rock hard body.

"Nothing...nothing whatever. Did you just lick my hand? That's gross." Steve let me go and wiped his hand on his pants. 

I shrugged. "Someone wouldn't let me go. Just be happy I don't bite...hard." He paused in the act of grabbing the last piece of pizza. "And you need to work on your lying. That didn't even sound convincing."

Natasha smirked. "Good luck with that. I'm convinced Rogers doesn't have a dishonest bone in his body. Come on, Steve. We still need to work out that last set of plans for the meeting tomorrow and Bruce's waiting for Sarah so they can play with the science equipment."

"Fine. See you later, Sarah. I'll come get you when it's time to go."

"Bye. I'll be here, pretending to be a lab rat."

Clint went with them, so it was only me, Tony and Bruce left in the lab. I stacked up the pizza boxes on a garbage can and found a little fridge with pop and water in it. I grabbed a water and washed down the taste of the pizza before going over to see what they were working on.

Several hours, a bunch of tests, and an insane amount of questions later, I was more than ready to go home by the time Steve came back. It looked like Tony and Bruce were going to keep working for a while; they didn't even look up when we said goodbye.

* * 

I stopped at the locker room to change and grab my duffle bag. Thank goodness Shield did my work laundry for me. My catsuits required a special kind of cleaning that I was more than happy enough to leave for the staff to do. A clean one would magically be hung up on my locker in the morning.

The ride home was quick. Steve was surprisingly aggressive when riding his bike. I stopped by Mr. Jones's apartment to tell him about my broken AC since I had forgotten earlier. He assured me he would get it taken care of first thing tomorrow morning. 

We went upstairs and went to our own apartments. I had told Steve earlier that he could come over after I took a shower, and since it was so late, Steve had told me he was going to order in Chinese for us. 

I fiddled with the AC and let it kick in while I showered. After changing into shorts and a tank top, I piled up my laundry. Tomorrow I was going to have to run a load so I wouldn't have to try to do it this weekend. While I was waiting for Steve, I put on the first Harry Potter to listen to as I tidied up a bit and packed my bag for tomorrow, making sure to include all the stuff I wanted to remember to keep in my locker. I heard a knock on my door and went to let Steve in with supper. 

* * *

Steve's POV

Sarah took the plastic bag from me and set it on the coffee table before reaching up and winding her arms around my neck.

"Hi," I grinned, leaning down to kiss her, pulling her closer. I breathed in her clean, lightly floral smell, letting myself relax now that we were alone. 

"Hi. I like this kind of greeting," she said, resting her head on my chest. 

I chuckled and in one swift move suddenly scooped her up in my arms and walked over to the couch. I sat down, still holding her tightly in my arms. "I've wanted to do that all day. You don't know how hard it was for me to be near you and not be able to touch you." I buried my face in her long loose hair and I could feel her warm breath on my neck.

"Yeah, I do cuz it was just as hard for me to keep my hands off you. You looked really hot in your training clothes."

"Thanks for warning me about your suit, by the way," I groaned, unable to get the picture out of my mind.

"Didn't think it would have that kind of effect on you. Didn't bother anyone else."

"That's because you kicked their butts."

"So you like my catsuit?" she teased.

My lips captured hers and deepened the kiss. "You know I did," I rasped, my hands tangling in her hair as I pulled her close. I lost track of time until my stomach growled loudly. 

Sarah sighed, pushed herself off of my lap, and took the still warm takeout out of the bag. It smelled great and I was starving. She went into the kitchen, coming back with plates and forks, handing them to me to plate us up while she went to get us something to drink.

"So you riding with me tomorrow? Weatherman says it's supposed to rain pretty much all day."

"Sure. It sucks to ride my bike in the rain. I get wetter from the traffic than the rain."

"Same time as today? Or do you want to spar before we have to go to meetings?"

"A workout would be great, but I don't think I would feel comfortable fighting you."

"Don't you work out with Natasha? Just treat me the same way you would her."

"I'll think about it. I can't promise more than that," I hedged.

She just smiled happily. "I'll take what I can get. If nothing else, we can use the holo-trainer."

I groaned. "You're really trying to push me out of my comfort zone, aren't you?"

"It's good for you. You've still got a lot of catching up to do."

"Yes...yes I do. You don't mind watching some of the shows on my list with me?"

"Course not." She slurped up a long lo-mien noodle, making me smile. "Can't promise not to fall asleep during them but I'd like to spend more time with you away from work. What's on your list?"

"A lot...I had a paper list but Nat entered it into my phone somehow so I could add to it anywhere." I tapped my phone and brought it up before handing it to her. She scrolled through it and laughed.

"We could take care of part of one of these tonight. I have Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone in the DVD player right now!"

"All right. I understand it's a series?"

"I'm so lending you the books! You really should read the book before you see the movie, but since this is going to be a little out there for you, I'll let you off the hook this time." She went over to the bookcase by the window and pulled out a book, handing it to me. I read the blurbs on the back cover and the flyleaf before setting it on the coffee table.

We finished eating, and I helped Sarah clean up by tossing the garbage. Refilling our waters, she hit the lights and started the movie. I noticed her watching me while I focused on the movie, her feet in my lap. 

I smiled when she fell asleep partway into the film, a faint smile on her lips. I stared at her for a long time, trying to capture this moment in my mind so I could draw it later. She looked so peaceful, curled up next to me. My fingers already itched for a pencil and paper as I looked at her. She was so beautiful I couldn't believe that she was interested in me. I didn't know her very well yet, but I wanted to.

* * *

Sarah's POV

Steve's laughter woke me once and I was cold, so I turned around and snuggled up to Steve, who pulled me into his lap and stroked my hair. I woke up a while later to a gentle kiss on my forehead. 

"It's getting late, Sarah. I'm going to go back to my apartment now."

"No...stay with me," I blinked up at him groggily.

"I shouldn't. It's not proper."

"Don't care 'bout proper...jus' want you to stay."

"Are you sure?"

"Mhh hmm."

"Then we'd better get you to bed before you fall back asleep."

"Okay." I fought my way to my feet and grabbed my phone to plug it in on my nightstand. I crawled under the covers and waited for Steve to join me. I heard him shut off the TV and lock my door before coming into the room. He tried to lay on the covers again but I was having none of that. 

"It's too hard to get close to you when I'm tangled in the covers. Please?" I was so tired that could hardly keep my eyes open long enough to glare at him, not that he could see me. "Steven Grant Rogers, get under the covers already." After a long moment, he stiffly got under the covers, not moving towards me. I rolled over and tucked my head in the crook of his neck, sighing happily. "See, that wasn't so hard, was it?" I felt him smile. "Night." I yawned and fell promptly asleep.

* *

I felt quite rested by the time I woke up the next morning. I glanced at my phone to see I had 20 minutes before my alarm was set to go off. We had rolled over during the night and Steve was curled around me, one arm draped over my stomach, legs tangled with mine. Nature was calling, so I carefully untangled myself and went to the bathroom. My bruise was thankfully gone. I went back into my bedroom to see that Steve was still asleep. 

Crawling back into bed, I faced him, just taking him in. I had never wanted to wake up next to someone before, but I could see its appeal. I was certainly physically attracted to him – he was handsome enough he could have been a model. I was a little worried that he was only interested in me because of my resemblance to Peggy, but there was nothing I could do about that other than be myself. I'm pretty sure I didn't act like her or sound like her. The couple of Shield videos I'd found had captured her distinctly British accent. At least I knew what I would look like when I was older. Shield had a lot of photos of her, so her career was pretty well documented. 

In no time at all, my alarm was going off. I hit snooze without looking, mostly to make sure I would actually get up. 

"Good morning sleepyhead." I smiled as his eyes opened and gave me a contented smile. 

"Good morning." He reached over to pull me onto him and I leaned down to give him a kiss, my hair falling around his face. I pulled back when my alarm went off and turned it off. I sat up on him and stretched my arms before climbing off him. A dull light was coming through my window and I could tell it was already raining.

"Ready for a workout?" He had come up behind me and wrapped his arms around me, his chin resting on top of my head. I rubbed my hands over his arms, enjoying the tactile feel of his muscles.

"Always up for a workout. See you in a couple of minutes?"


	8. Change of Plans

Steve's POV

I thought about Sarah as I went back to my apartment to get ready for the day. I was pleased that she wanted to spend time with me; she continually surprised me with what she could do. Who'd have thought she could beat Clint, Nat and Tony without even really breaking a sweat? I knew that the team didn't play well with others – they didn't even play well with their teammates – but they seemed like they were accepting of her and her abilities and she was making an effort to get to know them all better, which was good, considering we could be on missions for weeks with just the team for company.

I had watched her sleep for a while last night, admiring how open she was with me. I wasn't sure that staying overnight was wise, but I slept so much better with her there. I hadn't had nightmares for the past two nights, and since she expected me to actually lay down and hold her, I fell asleep, lulled by her trusting warmth. She enjoyed exercise just for the sake of exercise, but I was still apprehensive about actually sparring with her myself. I knew how strong I was; I could accidentally kill her with a single blow. 

I packed a change of clothes for after work and brushed my teeth before changing into what Natasha told me was workout gear, a tight gray Under Armor t-shirt and loose black shorts. I really liked the feel of these shirts, but I was convinced that she should've bought the next size up. I put on my running shoes and grabbed my phone, keys and bag, ready to go. I met Sarah in the hall and took her hand in mine as we went down the stairs to the garage to her car, a black Ford Taurus. We tossed our bags in the backseat and got in. She automatically buckled up and pulled out onto the street. At this hour, traffic wasn't too bad, the heavy rain making it seem like we were in our own world.

"What do you want to do tonight?" I asked. I didn't have anything planned, so I was hoping we would be able to spend time together.

"Well, I need to run a load of laundry, but other than that I don't care. What do you want to do?"

My eyes drank in the sight of her with city lights playing in her beautiful auburn hair. My fingers itched for a pencil and paper so I could draw her. I hadn't felt like drawing in a while – I hadn't felt like anything in a while – so it was a welcome feeling.

"Do you want to use my machine? Fury had it installed so I wouldn't have to worry about trying to get laundry done if I wasn't at home much."

She laughed knowingly. "Got your clothes stolen, didn't you."

"Maybe," I flushed, rubbing my hand over the back of my neck. That had been an interesting conversation with Natasha. I'd called her because I couldn't find them and was out of clean slacks. She had promptly – almost gleefully – taken me shopping for new clothes. I wasn't quite convinced she hadn't taken them herself just to engineer a shopping trip; she was certainly capable of it.

"That would be great. Can we hang out at your place then tonight? I can bring the second movie with."

"Sure. How many are there in this series?"

"Seven books, eight movies. Each movie is about a different year in school but the last year had to be split in two because it would have been way too long otherwise. The last movie is coming out in July."

"Are you going to stay awake for this one?" I teased.

"No promises. I have selective narcolepsy when it comes to movies I've seen a lot. I love listening to them – their music, the actors – I just can't seem to stay awake for the whole movie. In my defense, though, yesterday was a busy day for me. I got in three good workouts, after all."

"And you're ready for more?"

"Yup. Can't wait."

We had reached the security checkpoint, so we scanned our badges and continued in to the parking garage. I told her to park in my spot so it would be easier to find her car later. There were a lot of little black cars at Shield, after all. After a slight hesitation, she did, and we grabbed our gear and went inside. My phone went off while we were walking in. It was a text message from Maria saying that we were going to be going on a mission as soon as the whole team showed up. Sarah's phone buzzed too, so I'm guessing she got the same message.  


* *

Sarah's POV

My phone went off while we were walking in, and I pulled it out to look at it.

Maria: Mission moved up to now. Report to Shield ASAP. 

As soon as I got to the locker room I stripped and jumped in the shower. I hadn't showered earlier since I was planning on sparring with Steve before work. I lathered up good and rinsed off, making it a regrettably short shower. I dried off thoroughly, put back on the running capris and tank top I had worn in today, and pulled on the catsuit Shield's house elves had left ready for me. I put on deodorant and body spray, then pulled my hair up into a tight bun. I tucked my knives and short swords into their sheaths, my pistol in its holster and was ready to go. I shoved the rest of my stuff in my locker and walked to Fury's office to find out what was going on. 

I didn't have long to wait. Steve, Maria, Fury and Natasha were already there, so we started getting things figured out. I was going into the field with the Avengers. Overnight, our intelligence systems had picked up on possible Ten Rings activity in Kuwait. Nothing had been released to the press yet, so we were hoping to neutralize the threat before they set off another bomb. 

The Avengers were going in with minimal information, so I grabbed a tablet and started tapping away, half an ear on the chatter in the background. By the time Barton got there, I had narrowed down the possible transmission location to a 10 mile radius, but I wouldn't know more until we got closer.

"Do we have a hijab I can take with? I'm going to have to get closer to pinpoint this signal."

I looked up to see them looking at me in surprise. I threw the image up on the big screen. "This signal is identical to the other bombs they've set off. The frequency disappears at detonation, so someone has to be close enough to make sure that it detonates according to plan."

"So it probably has a timer in addition to the radio detonator," finished Bruce, rubbing a hand over his face. He had just come in just as I was speaking.

Natasha recovered quickly, "I know where I can get one," and ran out of the room.

I knew we were taking a Quinjet there, so the flight would be short, two hours, three tops. 

"Does this thing have cellular data? If not, I need one that does. Otherwise, if you're all ready, I can do the rest on the way."

"Of course," said Maria. "It will auto-link to Shield's satellite once you're in the air. Bruce can help you scan the local frequencies, his Arabic is passable."

"Great. I'll take the help."

"Let's move it, people. Clock's ticking."

Natasha came back in the room with a black bundle of fabric in her hands and a man's power suit thrown over her shoulder. I took the hijab from her and followed the team out.

* * *

Steve's POV 

We went up to the roof, where a Quinjet was running, waiting for us. We took our seats and strapped in. Clint and Natasha were co-piloting. Sarah was next to me, still tapping away at her computer with Bruce on her other side, also on his computer. Tony was going to meet us en route as Iron Man. 

"So why Jahra?" Sarah asked as she pulled up a satellite image of Kuwait. "If I was going to do some kind of strike to make a statement, I would choose Kuwait City or the airport."

"These guys tend to choose somewhere close to a major city, and whoever controls Jahra controls the Kuwait airport," Clint stated. 

"And Roxxon Oil's biggest competitor, Oracle Global, has a regional headquarters there." Tony's voice came in over our coms.

"I thought they were targeting Roxxon's head honchos in the last couple attacks?" Bruce asked.

"They were, but only the ones who weren't fully on board with Junior's rise to the throne." Tony put in. "They must be done cleaning house if they're moving on to their competitors."

"So they're partnering with the Ten Rings for hostile corporate maneuvers?" I asked, putting two and two together.

"Looks like it," said Bruce. 

"Well, that gives me a likely starting point," Sarah said. "I zoomed in on the Oracle headquarters via satellite but couldn't see any sign of attack. I tried to tap into their CC cameras, but couldn't find a way in. Someone seriously talented designed their system or they didn't have any cameras – and the paranoid SOB's have their internal communications on a tight leash." Sarah griped. "I'll have to link into their secure wireless to access their cameras – if they have them – and phone lines. Bruce, I need to know who runs this office – top five names."

"Can you do that from in the Quinjet?" I asked, already knowing the answer.

Natasha answered for me through our coms. "Nope. Shield's networks will try to keep her linked in. She'll need 100 yards to prevent interference. That's why she needs the hijab and Bruce gets the fancy duds. She can't go in there as a woman alone without a male escort. Tony's face is too well known and Bruce speaks Arabic well enough to get by; plus his dark hair won't stand out. Sorry Rogers, blondes are a little thin on the ground here."

"And Clint?" I asked.

"Is driving the getaway jet." Clint said over our coms. "The rest of you will be going in if necessary and I can't set her down for long; cloaking doesn't hide the shadows of big things in sandboxes. ETA 30 minutes. Evans, Banner, I suggest you get suited up."

"Arg, metal detectors at the door. Thank you Google Street view." Sarah sat back in frustration. "Guess I'm going in light. Romanoff, will my suit pass a metal detector?"

"Haven't needed to since they upgraded the material," Natasha said thoughtfully. "But it's got some reinforcement worked into the fabric, so probably not. Hill, do you know?" 

"Negative," Maria said. "I just asked Agent 13 to check for me, but my guess is no, it won't pass a metal detector."

Sarah sighed and handed me her computer as Natasha came back to where we were sitting. 

"Sarah, you will have to go in as is," said Maria. "Romanoff can find you a dress that will work for Jahra since you're the same size as her. Most women there don't wear more than the hijab, so you won't need a burqa. You'll find appropriate papers in compartment I for you and Bruce."

All right. I'll start getting ready." 

* * *

Sarah's POV

Natasha found a conservative dress that would blend in. Luckily Natasha and I were close to the same size and there were appropriate shoes in one of the compartments, since I obviously couldn't wear my combat boots with that dress. 

Bruce found identification papers establishing him as my husband, Hassan Naser. I unzipped my catsuit and pulled my arms free, working my way out of the skin tight outfit. 

"You're going to have to take that off, too." Natasha said, pointing at my sports bra as I pulled off my tank top. "The neckline of this dress won't cover it."

I turned my back to the guys before pulling the stretchy bra off and pulling the dress on. I sighed as I twitched the dress into place; I was only a slight B cup, so it wouldn't kill me to go without a bra, but it wasn't my favorite thing to do. I took off my capris since they showed under my dress and no respectable Middle Eastern woman would be caught wearing them in public. I folded up my discarded clothes and shoved them in an empty compartment with my boots on the floor and out of the way.

I put on the hijab carefully, covering my ears and hair, leaving my face free. I found some costume jewelry and put on a couple rings and some bracelets.

By the time I looked at him, Bruce had already changed into his suit, so I gave him his papers to look at and went to sit next to him. We didn't have a lot of time before landing, so I went through our story quickly.

"Hassan, I'm your newest wife, Fatimah, who is accompanying you to Jahra today to visit your family. We live in Egypt and are going to meet with your cousin Jalaal, whom I have never met and who happens to be pretty high up with Oracle. We have an appointment for 11:00; your alias will be listed in his calendar because that was the only thing I could remotely access. Luckily, Jalaal Nasser has a huge family, so it shouldn't be hard to actually not know you on sight."

"I'm assuming that in public you will have to act like a proper Arabic woman?"

I nodded. "Yup. Kuwait isn't super strict on the Islamic stuff, but I might have to follow you with my head down and act meek."

"You know what that word means?" Clint said from up front. "I can't wait to see that!"

"Focus, Barton. Yes Bruce, I'll have to observe how other couples are acting and go from there. If you'll put my tablet in your jacket pocket for me, I'll pretend to be online shopping while we wait."

"You should be able to tap into their system once inside if you're half as good as I think you are," Natasha smirked. 

"That's the plan." I said, smiling. "And I'm better, baby."

"Are you sure about this, Sarah?" asked Bruce quietly. "If things get ugly, I'll turn green. You have nothing – no weapons, no Kevlar – and you're wearing civilian clothes." 

* * *

Steve's POV

I felt a bad taste in my mouth when Bruce said that. He was right; she would be completely exposed, and that was a risk I wasn't comfortable with her taking. Tony would be in his Iron Man suit and Bruce was more than capable of taking care of himself. The other guy wouldn't allow him to be harmed. But Sarah was going in unarmed and in civilian clothes, and I wasn't comfortable with that. I knew she was a well trained Agent, and I'd seen how well she could fight against some of the best, but I was still afraid I was going to lose her again.

"Yes, I'm sure. This is what I was trained to do," Sarah said, glancing at me before taking Bruce's hand in hers, holding his eyes. "Bruce, if this information is accurate, we can stop the Ten Rings from holding a monopoly on crude oil prices worldwide and save a lot of people. If it's not, we should still be able to exit with our covers intact." 

"She's right, Bruce," Natasha said. "She needs your help. As a female, she can't go in there alone. You're going to have to reason with Jalaal and convince him to evacuate; chances are, he won't listen to her because she's not a man."

"Not all Arab men are that way," Bruce said, hedging. He pulled his hand away from her and turned his back to us.

"You want to take that chance right now?" Natasha asked him, "Because I don't."

"No, I don't, either Natasha." 

"Bruce, we know there's a bomb, and I've tried every way I know of – and for the record, that's a lot – and I can't do this remotely. I need to be inside to pinpoint the signal and I need you to help me get to it. I can't do this without you."

Bruce was quiet for a moment, studying her. She stood in front of him, her hands clasped behind her back and staring at him calmly, letting him see her as an agent instead of a young woman. 

"Okay, Sarah. I'll do what I can to get you there. Then what?"

"We disarm it," Sarah said, smiling. "Right, Iron Man?"

"Damn straight, kid." said Tony. "If you feed me the signal when you find it, I'll do the heavy lifting. There's too much interference for Jarvis to confirm anything." 

"ETA two minutes and counting. Cloaking engaged, " said Clint from up front. "I'm dropping you on the roof of a nearby apartment building. Tony, where are you going to be?"

"On standby for now. Oracle's roof has basic security, cameras, guards, the usual. I'm going to give them something to look at while you land so they don't notice the jet."

"Sounds good," Natasha said, nodding. "Who's losing a boat in the Marina?"

"Hah. That's for me to know and you to find out," Tony said with a laugh. 

I muted my com and turned to Sarah. "Can I talk to you for a moment?"

She looked at me curiously but muted hers as well before nodding. "Yeah, Steve. What's on your mind? Are you all right?" She put her hand on my arm, her eyes sweeping over me quickly.

"I'm just concerned about you going into a building that we know a bomb is in without any sort of armor."

Her expression blanked and she removed her hand from me abruptly. "And this is any different from you doing this exact same thing last week, Captain?"

Somehow I didn't think her sudden use of my title was coincidental, but I wasn't exactly an expert on women. "Yes, this is different. I had my suit and my shield. You're wearing a dress."

Sarah crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow, her face still blank. "What about Agent Romanoff? Do you try talking her out of going on solo missions without an extraction plan? Word around Shield is that she and Barton never have an extraction plan when they go in."

"Sarah-"

She held up one hand, cutting me off. "Captain Rogers – I can do this. I realize this is hard for you, but this is my job and you need to let me do it. I know the risks and I made my peace with God a long time ago."

Her words sank in and I panicked, reaching for her. "Peggy, don't say that!"

She evaded my grasp, taking a step back from me. "I'm not Peggy, but from what I know of Agent Carter, she wouldn't ever have let you dictate what she could and couldn't do, and neither will I. I'm sorry, Captain Rogers, but please excuse me, I have a job to do." She walked away from me and tapped her com, turning it back on as she met Bruce by the cargo ramp just as we felt the gentle bounce of touchdown. 

I sighed as I watched her walk off the jet before I turned my com back on, taking my seat again. Natasha turned to give me a look and shook her head before hitting the button to close the ramp. I knew I'd messed up somehow, but I wasn't sure where, exactly. I hoped they accomplished their mission quickly today, because I didn't like knowing Sarah was angry with me.


	9. Man Down

Sarah's POV

Bruce and I made our way off the jet quickly, heading to the door that would take us inside. I felt a wash of hot air as the Quinn jet lifted back off. Once inside, we took the elevator to the lobby. It was a pretty nice building, so we fit in fine. I double checked my reflection in the shiny metal, but everything was in place. We went outside and I took Bruce's arm, since I noticed the other couples were walking together like that. We walked down a block to where Oracle had their offices. It was a large building with more glass than metal or stone. I listened to the chatter of the people around me, getting into the proper mindset. On our way, I chattered to Bruce in Arabic, testing him a bit.

"So we are going to meet your cousin? Why didn't he come to your Father's house like the rest of them?"

"He has always been busy working. I have not seen him in a long time."

"What is it that he does again?"

"He is an important man at Oracle Global. I had heard he was promoted not long ago, so I don't know what he does now."

We got to the front door of the lobby and the doors slid open automatically.

"So he will be expecting us?"

Bruce smiled, understanding what I was doing and getting into character. "Yes, woman. Now hush and be an obedient wife."

"Yes, husband." 

I let go of Bruce's arm to follow a couple steps behind him. We walked over to the security checkpoint. They asked our names and business there, so Bruce showed them our papers and acted like he was insulted he was being kept waiting. He did a very good portrayal of a rich Middle Eastern man. They had us take out our phones, remove our watches and jewelry and go through the metal detectors. I put back on my jewelry as I quietly waited behind Bruce, eyes down but taking everything in. The guard gave Bruce two passes and told him which elevator to take. He handed me my pass and said, "Come now, Fatimah. We don't want to keep Cousin Jalaal waiting."

We took the elevator the guard indicated and went to the top floor. There was a reception area and Bruce gave his alias to the secretary, who said it would be a little bit before our guy would be ready. We took seats by the window and Bruce handed me my tablet. 

"Thank you, husband."

"Good, we can see you," said Clint. 

I woke up my tablet and got to work, making it look like I was a bored woman shopping online. Bruce pulled his phone out and tapped at it, boosting my signal. It took a little bit, but I got onto their secure wireless channels and started sweeping for the signal I had found earlier. It was much stronger than before and it was on this floor. I held the tablet so Bruce could see it.

"I like this one but I'm not sure where it would come from."

"It's very nice. I'm sure we could find it while we're here. You should ask Mother if she has seen one like it in the shops she favors." 

"Same signal as the last two bombs," Natasha said. "I sent it to Tony. Can you tell where it's coming from?"

"I will try to remember to do that," I said as I tried to trace it further, but only coming up with the same exact thing. I couldn't block the signal and I couldn't narrow it down. I could tell if I was getting warm or cold, but that was it.

"Got a lock on the signal, Sarah," said Tony. "Good enough to get me close, at least."

"Good," Bruce said, "I'm glad we had time to meet my cousin today."

"You speak so highly of him, husband. Look at this one."

"It's coming from near your guy's office," Natasha said.

"I'm getting interference – I'll need visual and a way in." Tony said. 

Just then the secretary told us to follow her, her boss was ready for our appointment.

"Getting warmer," said Tony. I couldn't look at my screen yet, so I followed Bruce in. There was a 30 something Middle Eastern man in a well cut suit behind the desk, no one else in the room. The secretary shut the door behind us, heels clicking on the tile floor as she returned to her desk.

To my left there was an adjoining door, but I didn't know what or who was behind it. It wasn't on the floor plans I had on my screen. Jalaal rose to meet us and Bruce greeted him like the family he was pretending to be, introducing him to me. However, he was confused and clearly didn't know us. His hand moved to summon others and I decided I should jump in. I grabbed his hand firmly and spoke rapidly in idiomatic Arabic. He was young to be in a position of command; I was hoping he was Westernized enough to listen to me without dismissing me out of hand. 

"Sir, we are here to help you. There is a bomb planted somewhere in your building. We think your company is being targeted by the Ten Rings. We need your cooperation to find it."

His shock was apparent, not only at a female for addressing him in such a way but because of the possibility of being a target. "How do you know this?" His eyes went to Bruce, addressing him instead of me.

I flipped my tablet around and showed him. A small pulsing blue dot was hidden in the floorplans. "This signal is on the same frequency as the last two of the Ten Rings bomb broadcasts."

"A crippling blow against Oracle would give Roxxon at least a temporary monopoly in the area. I'm sure you are aware of this." Bruce said, his stance rigid. 

Jalaal nodded. "There have been rumors of one of the sons wanting to take over running the company. I thought that would work in our favor if they had someone less business savvy in control."

"Well, maybe normally, but unfortunately, Junior's more ruthless than his dad. Who is in command of this building?"

"I am. My other superiors are out of town this week." 

"Excellent – you are just the man I need." I flashed him a smile. "Can you get the building evacuated? Say that you smelled gas and want the building cleared immediately as a safety precaution. We don't know how much time we have, so if you can get everyone clear fast, that is for the best." His face was alarmed, but he grabbed the phone. He sounded a little strained, but like most companies of this size, they had procedures in place for certain situations. It would certainly make the news today, but hopefully in a positive way. 

"Is there a window that opens in your office?" Bruce asked at I tapped at the tablet, sweeping the office as I walked the perimeter. It wasn't in here, but it was close by.

"Yes, but why?"

"I need to let our tech expert in without starting a panic. Are the guards on the roof loyal to you?" 

"They are family." he shrugged like that was a given. In this part of the world, it was.

"Have them escort you outside. If whoever is working with the Ten Rings sees the evacuation, they could set the bomb off early. You don't want to waste time getting clear."

He pulled out a cell phone and someone answered. He gave the guards the same story and based on his side of the conversation, they were going to meet him in the stairwell. 

"Tony, roof is being cleared. We'll have a window open for you in a minute," I said in English.

"Thought you were going to leave me out in the cold, Evans." said Tony.

"Don't tempt me," I snarked.

"Sir, which window opens?" asked Bruce.

Jalaal pointed to one behind his desk and Bruce went to open it. The hot desert wind blew inside and moments later Tony landed. An overhead announcement come on stating that the entire building was to be evacuated and lights flashed from the fire alarms. 

I switched back to Arabic. "What's behind that door?" I asked, the dot pulsing faster as I got closer to it.

"A water closet."

Deciding that Jalaal needed to get himself clear and that we didn't have any further need of him, I said, "Thank you for your cooperation, sir. Stress to your staff that they shouldn't return today until the workmen have had time to fix the problem. As soon as this floor is clear we are going to approach that office, so you need to leave now."

"Of course. Thank you for your timely assistance. Will you contact me afterwards? I would like to be kept informed."

Bruce nodded. "Certainly."

Jalaal gave him a card after scribbling what I assumed was a private cell phone number on the back. After one last look at me, he walked briskly from the room, shutting the door behind him.

"Your call Tony. Is this section clear? I know it's not in here, but it's close."

Tony scanned through the walls before opening the door. "No heat signatures. It's either in the wall or in the other office. Something is giving Jarvis interference."

"Tell me when this floor is clear and we'll check it."

"Maybe another minute and then we'll see what we're dealing with. I don't want them to see me if they don't have to."

"Sarah, Bruce, you should get yourselves clear as well." Natasha's voice came over the coms. "We're landing on the roof now."

"I'm staying," said Bruce. "Sarah, give me your tablet and get out of here. I'm going to help Tony."

"We're clear," Tony said. "Get going, kid."

I nodded, handing my tablet to Bruce. "Be my guest." I headed for the door. "Barton, Romanoff, I'm on my way to the roof. Is the coast clear?" I ran to the stairwell and sprinted up. 

"We've swept the perimeter and checked all of the obvious places,"

"What about the less obvious places?"

"What do you take us for, rookies?" Clint said, sounding offended. "Of course we checked them too. We haven't seen any company, but keep your eyes open."

"Roger that," I replied, pausing at the doorway to hike the skirt of my dress up with one hand so I could move easier. I located the Quinjet easily as I started to dash across the sweltering roof to the jet, not wanting to be in the open any longer than I had to.

The ramp was open and the jet was cloaked, but someone observing would be able to tell it was there. I had to go around a roof vent and turned abruptly to make the corner just as a large caliber sniper round passed clear through my upper right shoulder, knocking me down. I scraped my side on the gravel of the roof and felt my head hit something hard as I fell, knocking me out cold.

 

* * *

Steve's POV

I never heard the shot, but I saw Sarah get hit. She'd turned slightly to avoid a vent on the roof, which had caused the bullet to go through her shoulder instead of her heart, the force of the impact knocking her down. "We've got company!" I shouted as I raced out to get her the moment I realized she wasn't moving, more shots rebounding off my shield and suit. Natasha covered me, both pistols out and emptying her magazines in the direction the shot came from. 

"Evans is down," she said. "GSW, possibly unconscious. Threat neutralized."

I scooped her limp body up in my arms and dashed back to the jet, covering her with my shield as best I could and praying she wouldn't get hit again when a slug rebounded off the concrete and struck her arm. 

"We're in," I said as I ran up the ramp, Natasha closing it behind me as Clint lifted off, getting us out of range of the snipers. Natasha grabbed the med pack, bringing over to where I was laying Sarah down on the floor – there wasn't anyplace else to put her. 

I gently pulled off the hijab she still wore, feeling the large contusion where her head had hit. I tore the fabric of her dress to get it out of the way while Natasha opened the med pack and handed me some gauze. I wiped away the blood so we could see how bad the entry wound was; blood welled out of the wound but not like a blood vessel had been hit. I breathed a little easier seeing that because I knew there was an artery very near the wound.

We rolled Sarah on her side to look at her back to see if there was an exit wound, tearing the fabric of her dress some more. Initially, all I could see was blood and torn flesh - the back of her shoulder was a mess. I could feel the panic clawing at me, but I pushed it down. I didn't have time to deal with it right now; we needed to stabilize her. I took a couple deep breaths and started carefully wiping away the blood on her back so we could see what it actually looked like. 

The bullet had exited, leaving an awful mess behind. Dark ruby red blood seeped out instantly, a lot faster than I would have liked to see. If we couldn't get the bleeding under control, Sarah could lose too much before we got back to the Triskelion.

Looks like it went all the way through," Natasha said, probing the edges. "Doesn't look great, but it doesn't look like it hit anything major." Natasha said as she put a large pad of gauze on both sides of the wound and held them firmly. I tucked the hijab under Sarah's head so it wasn't at such an odd angle. She was so pale I was starting to worry.

"Talk to me, Stark," I demanded. "Tell me you found it."

"We found it," Tony replied. "Now we need to deal with it."

"Great. Do you know how to deactivate it?"

"Still working on that," Bruce said. "It's more complicated than last time."

"We're at 3 minutes left on the timer, so we're lucky to find it when we did," Tony continued. "If nothing else, I'll make Bruce eat it."

"Not amusing, Tony," I growled. 

"Kidding Capsicle - just kidding; I think we've got it disarmed, but I'm taking it with me to detonate it over open water."

"Good job, Stark, Bruce. Scan it first for Fury before you blow it up. Bruce, we're coming to pick you up. Clint will tell you specifics." I heard Clint talking to Bruce, but tuned it out. Sarah was still laying on the ramp, so I was going to have to move her again.

"Natasha, if you can hold that tight for a moment, I'm going to pick her up again. She can't stay here."

"We need to keep pressure on the wound, Steve." Natasha said. "She's already bled through the gauze on the back."

"I'll hold her as soon as we get her off this ramp. That way I can keep the pressure on and you'll be free to help Clint. Bruce can look at it as soon as we pick him up." I felt Natasha looking at me searchingly, but she agreed. 

"Okay. I'm not sure if the company is still there yet, so I'm going to cover Bruce until he gets in. The last thing we need right now is a code green." 

I picked up Sarah and saw the blood dripping from Natasha's fingers, pooling beneath Sarah. I sat down on the bench seats at the side of the jet, sitting her up so she was leaning on my chest. I shifted so I could easily get my arms around her to hold pressure when Natasha let go. There was a good sized puddle of blood left behind on the floor, which ran down the ramp as Nat opened it up and stood ready to cover Bruce's exit. A couple seconds later, Bruce was coming up the ramp. Clint had backed up to a balcony so he could jump in. 

"We got it disarmed. The signal disappeared as soon as we deactivated it and we didn't see signs of any more. I'll have Fury call Jalaal in a little bit." Bruce was taking off the jacket and tie and rolling up his sleeves. He found a pair of gloves in the med pack and came to look at Sarah's wounds. I felt the jet jump into top speed as Clint and Natasha took us home.

He peeled back the gauze on top of the wound and I held the flashlight he handed me so he could look at it. He leaned her forward and looked under the gauze on her back and put more on top of the soaked pad. 

"At least it went all the way through. It looks like she'll need stitches at the very least and a good cleaning out when we get back to Shield."

"Can you take that bullet out of her arm? It ricocheted off the concrete and hit her."

"Yes, now that I've see the worst of her injuries. Just keep her elevated and hold pressure on that one like you have been." He dug through the kit, coming up with a pair of tweezers and wiping them with antiseptic. "Did she lose consciousness before or after you moved her?"

"Before – I think she hit her head when she went down." 

"I'll check that in a moment," he said, resting her arm on his leg to get at the bullet. It must not have been in very far because he had it out in less than a minute and was wrapping her arm with gauze. "Hmm, that was larger than I expected. If this is the size that went through her, she's lucky it didn't hit her brachial artery. It can't have missed it by much."

I watched as Bruce carefully touched the head, probing the base of her skull before laying her head gently back on me before checking her eyes with his flashlight.

"She's got a good sized goose egg from the impact and a moderate concussion." He sat back in the seat across from us. "How did it happen? It had to have been right after she left us inside."

"Sniper." I shook my head, careful not to jar her. "I didn't see where it came from but Nat took a few shots."

"I hit someone," Natasha said, "but he wasn't alone. I couldn't tell who he was working for; he was pretty far away. They didn't really open fire until Steve was drawn out, though. They were after bigger fish than her."

"I think that bigwig you talked to was probably really his original target, based on the trajectory," said Clint. "He could have easily wiped him from where Nat hit that guy. A full wall of glass, a desk that backs it, lone target – child's play."

"And the bomb would cover up the assassination," Natasha said. "No one looks for bullet wounds when a building falls on them."

"Open the hatch; I'm hitching a ride," said Tony. Clint backed off the speed slightly and cracked it open long enough for Tony to slip in and shut it again, returning to cruising speed.

Tony's armor opened up and he stepped out, avoiding the puddle of blood on the floor. He came to sit next to us and put Sarah's legs on his lap. "She's going to be okay, right?"

"Yeah," Bruce answered. "Minor wound to the arm, concussion and one that we need to clean up when we get home. Went straight through her right shoulder."

Tony let out a deep sigh. He'd clearly been worried – was still worried, which puzzled me. They'd only talked a couple times at Shield and neither one acted like they were more than teammates. He thought for a moment before saying what was weighing on his mind. "You know, when she first showed up, I didn't know what to think. Peggy Carter was one of my dad's best friends, surprisingly enough."

"Hardly surprising to me, Tony. Howard adored Peggy; she kept him on the straight and narrow."

"They founded Shield together and she came to dinner a lot to talk about stuff with my dad and told me Captain America stories before bed." He glanced at me with a self-depreciating smile. "Aunt Peggy was the only family I had left after my parents died...I know Sarah isn't Peggy, but in a strange way, I kind of feel like she understands me, sees the real me." He hesitated, taking a deep breath, and finished his thought. "I almost feel like I'm being given more time with her; a second chance to make her proud of me."

I closed my eyes and leaned my head back for a moment, processing what Tony was telling me. "Same here, Tony, same here," I finally said, opening my eyes and meeting his.


	10. Mission Report

Sarah's POV

I woke up in a hospital bed wearing a thin cotton gown. My head felt fuzzy and there was a metallic taste in my mouth. I tried to get up, but moving sent a jolt of pain through my right shoulder. Damn it, I got shot again. I hated getting shot; those wounds always took a couple days to heal. I tried to move the gown so I could see how bad it was, but they had it all covered up. My forearm was wrapped in a bandage as well, but I only recalled being shot once, so I wasn't sure what that was from.

I looked around the room and saw they had me hooked up to an IV and were giving me antibiotics. Mentally shrugging at that one, I guess from their viewpoint that was standard procedure and necessary for most humans after trauma, but they wouldn't speed my recovery.

Throwing off the covers, I swung my legs over and put my bare feet on the cold tile floor. I turned off the IV pump and disconnected the line to my port in my elbow. It hurt to move my right arm, but as long as I took my time, it was bearable. 

Using my good arm, I pushed myself up and went over to the tiny bathroom. I washed my hands and face and swished water in my mouth to get rid of that horrible blood taste. Looking at myself in the mirror, I decided I didn't look that bad. There was a swollen, tender spot on the back of my head that throbbed, but it hadn't broken open. I heard voices in my room and figured I'd better see what was going on. Steve was talking to a nurse, who'd realized I wasn't where she'd left me.

"Hey Steve," I said, my voice a little hoarse. "What are you doing here?" 

I was completely unprepared for his reaction. He pulled me into a tight hug that drove the air from my lungs; mostly because I wasn't anticipating that kind of intensity. I patted him on the back with my good arm, wheezing, "Can't...breathe!" 

"Sorry, Sarah." Instantly he loosened his grip but didn't release me. I sucked in a deep breath and started coughing, my lungs overwhelmed by the sudden influx of oxygen. The movement sent pain jolting down my arm and my vision dimmed for a second. 

"Are you trying to kill me?" I huffed when I caught me breath, "Let Romanoff do it – it'll be quicker."

"You don't get off that easy, Evans." I peeked around Steve and saw Natasha grin at me. "Steve, let the poor girl go so she can get back in bed like a good little patient." Oh good lord! They were all here and I was in an open backed hospital gown.

"Yeah, don't be a good little patient, Sarah," Clint said with a smirk from the doorway, "We're enjoying the entertainment." He slapped Steve on the back as he walked past. I'm pretty sure Clint put some effort into it but Steve didn't budge an inch.

"Things were pretty boring before you showed up, kid." Tony smirked, standing next to Clint. 

"How long was I out?" I looked at Bruce, who was just inside the door. He was polishing his glasses on his shirt. I took a step back from Steve, who let go of me to help me get back into the bed. Natasha covered me back up and took a chair on my left. 

"Oh, maybe four hours? They had to put you under so they could clean up the wound. Bullet went straight through, missed all the important stuff, like bones, blood vessels, etc," said Bruce.

"And this?" I held up my forearm. "I don't remember this one."

"That happened while I was carrying you to the jet," Steve said. "They opened fire and one ricocheted off the concrete behind us and hit you. Bruce pulled it out on the way home."

"What did I get hit with? It knocked me back, so it must have been pretty big."

"We think you were hit with a .308 based on the damage you received," Natasha said. "That's what Bruce pulled out of your forearm."

"Would my suit have stopped it?"

"No," said Natasha. "It isn't made for that size of a round; if you'd been wearing it, it probably would have made more of a mess and pushed a lot more fibers into the wound, so you were lucky."

"Did you find it, the bomb?"

"Yes, we did." said Bruce. "It was lucky we got there when we did. There were three minutes left when Tony disarmed it and blew it up over the ocean." He looked satisfied.

"That's great!" I smiled. "So what did Jalaal say about it?"

"Don't know," Bruce said, giving me a small smile. "I had Fury take care of that part. We were a little occupied at that point."

"Who was shooting at us? I didn't hear anything, so they had to have been a ways away from Oracle."

"We don't know, but they had to be working for the Ten Rings. There wasn't anything on the news other than a safety evac for a possible gas leak," said Clint.

"So how soon can I bust out of here? I'm ready to go home if someone could find me some clothes."

They exchanged glances, and I had the feeling I wasn't going to like the answer.

"Yeah, about that..." said Tony. "You've got to talk to Fury before they'll spring you."

"Where's my phone?"

"Ha. You're funny. Good try, but seriously you have to go see him in person. His house, his rules."

I gave them a skeptical look, but no one argued with Tony. "Is this one of those 'unwritten' rules that I haven't learned yet?"

"Something like that," Clint said. "Suck it up, buttercup."

"Fine. What floor and wing am I on? I don't remember this part of the tour."

"I'll take you," said Steve. "Natasha, can you find her something to wear?"

"Incredibly stylish hospital pajama pants coming up." She smirked before she walked out of the room and talked to my nurse, who left to go get them. In the meantime, Natasha kicked everyone out of my room. I could've swore I saw Clint handed her a twenty on his way out, but I couldn't be sure.

"So why do I have to talk to Fury?" I asked as soon as the room was clear. I swung my feet out and pulled the long baggy pants up my legs before standing. They had a drawstring, so Natasha tied it tight for me when I couldn't get my fingers to cooperate. 

"Anyone who gets injured on an Avengers mission is required to report in to Fury before they'll release you. If it takes you a week to be able to walk there, you stay here a week. Mission captain is also required to show up for that meeting." Natasha tied up the back of my gown and steadied me while I put on the flats I had worn on the mission.

"Who was in charge?" I asked, not aware of anyone actually giving orders, per se.

"Steve and I."

Natasha opened the door for me and I saw Steve waiting in the hallway for me. Everyone else had left, for now. They sandwiched me in the middle and we headed up to Fury's office. Turns out we were in the same wing, just several floors down. I was tired by the time we got there, though. I must have lost more blood than I thought I had.

* * *

Steve's POV

Natasha had thought Sarah would want to see Fury right away, whether that was a good idea or not. She looked really pale and I could tell her shoulder was hurting, so it was against my better judgment that Natasha and I walked Sarah to Fury's office less than an hour after she woke up. 

I knocked on Fury's door and heard him tell us to come in. This wasn't the first time I'd had to walk a teammate in here after I screwed up. I always hoped each time would be the last, but it never got any easier. They were my team; my responsibility.

"Well, Agent Evans, I have to admit I'm surprised to see you here already today." Nick looked her over with a concerned expression. The pointed looks Natasha and I got were no more than I expected.

"They tell me I need to come get yelled at before I get to go home, sir." Sarah said with a hint of a smile.

Nick had a pained look on his face at her bluntness. "Let me guess, Tony told you that?"

"Not in quite so many words," she grinned at him, more like her normal self. "But now I know where Director Gregg got the idea from."

"Rogers, grab Agent Evans a chair before she falls over." Fury said, smiling slightly. "I heard you've spent a fair amount of time on the receiving end of this lecture at Ops."

"Yessir, I have. Pretty sure I know it by heart." 

I walked over the table and grabbed two chairs. I set them behind Sarah and Natasha and waited for them to sit. At Natasha's sharp glance, I grabbed another one for myself and sat down on the other side of Sarah.

"Now tell me how you managed to get yourself shot in Kuwait on a bomb-finding mission, Agent Evans."

"Wrong place at the wrong time," she replied. "Can't see how I could've changed that. Ten Rings must've had someone watching to make sure the bomb went off so they could air their chaos video like they usually do. I was in a glass box, easily visible with the right equipment. If they saw what I was doing, then I was a more...reachable...threat; one that still needed to be eliminated."

"Why not take you out inside?"

"Then the others would be alerted to their presence sooner than they were ready for. It's not like they could take out Iron Man or the Hulk, Jalaal was mixed into the crowd and I was on an open rooftop."

"Romanoff, report."

"Clint and I had our eyes peeled for trouble. We swept the perimeter thoroughly and didn't see anything. With the amount of heat reflecting off surrounding surfaces, we couldn't rely on our instruments. Gut feeling was that someone was probably out there, but either not in position, because we had already checked the roof I shot him on, or at the least, under cover until he took a shot. But because we couldn't find them, we had to wait until they made their move before neutralizing them. Got the bastard, but not before they got a lucky hit in."

"Rogers, report."

"We got there at 1035 their time and dropped off Evans and Banner as planned. We circled overhead, on alert for trouble, checked all the nearby roofs. They made it in, covers intact, went to the top floor. We could see them through the windows the whole time they were on the top floor. Evans' signal gave Stark what he needed to find the package. They cleared the building and since Evans' part was done, she retreated as directed to the jet. 

Evans was almost in the clear when she got hit. If she hadn't turned at the last second to avoid an obstacle, we would've been bringing back a body instead of an agent. She went down and I ran out and grabbed her, bringing her inside. Hostiles opened fire on me the moment I was off the jet and didn't stop until Romanoff got a couple shots off and one guy went down. Only saw the one shooter, sniper, at least ½ mile away, but I know there were at least two more based off what I was blocking. We performed field dressing on Evans until we could get back to Shield." 

"Oracle Global and Mr Jalaal Nasser are extremely appreciative of the assistance today." Nick looked at Sarah and grinned. "He did also say that if you chose to divorce your husband, he would offer a large marriage settlement for you to become his principle wife."

Sarah cracked a smile and Natasha laughed at that statement. I was a little confused for a moment before I remembered that her cover for this mission was as Bruce's wife.

"I'm afraid I'll have to pass on his generous offer. I'm sure you said something politically correct on my behalf?"

Nick snorted. "Didn't see you having a lifelong ambition to become a camel herder."

"Not particularly - camels and I don't get along well. Can I go home now? It's been a long day."

"Yes, you may go home as soon as the doctor gives you your discharge instructions. Have someone drive you and stay home tomorrow." Nick dismissed us and Natasha took Sarah to get her stuff out of her locker. I took a moment to put the chairs back, so they were almost out the door when Nick spoke again.

"Captain Rogers, a moment if you will?"

I nodded and turned back to him. "Are you all right, Cap? You've had a couple of...upsets...this week."

"I'm working things out. I know Sarah isn't Peggy; the resemblance is striking, to say the least. I've been getting to know Sarah, spending some time with her."

"I don't know if you were aware of this, but I happen to know Peggy Carter quite well. I've been observing Evans for several years, so I know that Evans is nothing like her in anything other than her physical resemblance and her dedication to Shield. Given your involvement with her, watching her go down today had to have been rough on you." I could see him assessing me, but it was as a man who had been in my place, not as my boss.

"In more ways than you know. It's not something I want to see happen ever again."

"I hear the bullet just missed an artery by a hair."

"It did. Doctors were just pulling the last of the fibers out when for some reason – whether they hit it or it was already weakened – it gave way unexpectedly. She lost a lot of blood today."

"You might as well stay home tomorrow, too. You're overdue for some R&R...and someone should check in on her anyways. I understand you're right next door." 

"Yes, sir. See you Friday, then." I wasn't going to turn that offer down, it just made it so I didn't need to ask to check on her.

"Good luck, Rogers." Nick clapped me on my shoulder. "I have a feeling you'll need it to make sure she follows orders. Maybe she'll listen to you."

I scoffed, "I can try, but she has a mind of her own."

"All the good ones do, Rogers." Fury said with a smile. "Glad to see you've hit it off with her."

I wasn't sure what to say to that, so I turned and went out the door, heading back to the hospital floor to get Sarah. She'd already changed into her capris, tanktop and tennis shoes with her right arm was in a sling to keep her from using it. They were clearly just waiting for the doctor to come by with papers. I held my hand out to Sarah and she slapped my palm and grinned cheekily.

"Hilarious," I said. "Hand over your keys; I'll take your bag down and pull the car up."

"Fine," she sighed. "Can we get something to eat before we go home?" Natasha's eyebrows shot up and I knew I was getting a phone call later for sure.

"Sure. What are you hungry for?" I asked, shrugging her bag over my shoulder.

"I dunno," Sarah said, fiddling with the hospital bracelet on her wrist. "I'll figure it out by the time we leave."

The doctor came in then to talk to her, so I went to get her car.

Natasha and Sarah were just walking out as I pulled up to the curb. I got out and opened the passenger door for her, letting her get in at her own pace. I shut the door and looked at Natasha, who was looking at me with a small smile. "If either of you need me, call." She squeezed my forearm and turned to walk back inside. I walked around and got in the driver's seat. Sarah looked exhausted and was resting her head on her left arm.

"You okay?" I asked. "We'll be home soon."

"I'll be better once I get something to eat. Mickey D's is fine with me right now."

"What is Mickey D's?"

"McDonald's – haven't you heard of that one?"

"It's a burger place, I think?" I'm sure I had seen their signs on the way to Shield, but I had never been to one.

"Then we're definitely going there. It's classic American food; there's one a couple blocks from home."

* *

I parked the car and grabbed Sarah's bag after coming around to open her door for her. She insisted on walking up all the stairs, even though I told her I could carry her. She was pale and tired by the time we reached our floor, but she made it. I unlocked her apartment door and followed her in. 

We sat at the table to eat the greasy burgers and fries she'd ordered for us. The chocolate shake wasn't bad – not sundae shop quality – but not bad. I cleaned up after us and washed my hands; Sarah just watched me tiredly, exhaustion in every line of her posture as she sat at the table, sipping her shake.

"Do you still want to watch that movie tonight?" I knew she wouldn't stay awake for long, but this way I could stay with her for a while. She didn't answer right away and I was starting to think she hadn't heard me. 

"I'm not sure that's a good idea, Steve." She took a deep breath before continuing, her eyes on her shake. "I've been thinking, and maybe we'd be better off not being...interested." Her teeth worried her bottom lip as I comprehended what she was saying: she didn't want to see if we were meant to be more than friends. 

I shook my head. "I'm sorry I said what I did; I know now that I shouldn't have. Natasha told me that every female agent she knows would have reacted the same way you did, so I guess I still don't know anything about women."

She snorted. "You think? If I thought you were saying it as legit orders from my Captain, it would've been a different story. I wouldn't have argued with you then. But Steve the man, telling me I can't do my job because I'm a woman - that's not acceptable."

I reached across the table and covered her hand with mine, thankful she didn't pull away. "Other than Natasha and Maria, you're the only other woman I've really worked with in this time, Sarah. I guess I'm still getting used to how things are now." I smiled apologetically. "Women didn't do this kind of stuff in my time. Peggy's the only other woman I know who went into the field and even then, she didn't do what you do."

She studied me for a long moment before speaking. "I can understand that, I guess. This century is radically different from what you're used to. So is that the only reason why you flipped?"

"Flipped? What does that mean?"

"Sorry," she sighed. "It's slang...it means losing control, going crazy or both." 

"Sarah, you basically told me you were okay with dying and I was just supposed to say 'go ahead'? No, I'm not okay with that."

She scrunched her eyebrows up and stared at me. "How on earth did you get that out of what I said? You lost me."

"You told me you'd made your peace with God – what else was I supposed to think that meant?"

"I said – 'I can do this. I realize this is hard for you, but this is my job and you need to let me do it. I know the risks and I made my peace with God a long time ago.' I didn't mean that I was okay with dying, only that I don't blame God for anything that happens to me or my team on missions. This wasn't my first mission, Steve. Not by a long shot. I've been going on them since I was 15."

I struggled to wrap my head around that. "When I was 15, I was getting beat up in alleys and tossed in dumpsters."

Sarah smiled slightly. "You went looking for fights, according to Jace's grandpa." 

"Maybe," I said, not wanting her to think badly of me. "I'm sorry I overreacted. Do you forgive me?"

"Yes, and I'm sorry I snapped at you earlier. I just thought you weren't going to let me do what needed to be done because you thought I was some weak woman or some wet behind the ears kid."

"Never – I just can't stand the thought of losing you when I've just found you." I rubbed my thumb over the back of her hand, watching as a flush spread over her cheeks. "I didn't know you were that good with computers, by the way."

"There's a lot you don't know about me, Rogers," she said with a faint smile. "Do you still want to watch that movie?"

"Are you sure? You look tired."

"I'd still like to spend time with you, Steve; I'm just not sure about getting involved with you is a good idea yet." Her eyes met mine. "I can't be who you want me to be."

"I understand, and I don't expect you to be anything other than yourself. I'd like to continue to spend time with you, if you don't mind."

She smiled gently. "See you in a few, then; just let yourself back in."


	11. Emoji's and Heiroglyphs

Sarah's POV

I wasn't sure that it was wise to want to see more of Steve outside of work, but I wasn't going to cut off my nose to spite my face. I was very attracted to him, and I could tell he was attracted to me as well. I wasn't sure if he saw me or Peggy when he looked at me, though. That's what hurt me the most, the thought that he might only want to be with me because he thought I was Peggy.

I went into my room and put on sleeping clothes, opting for a t-shirt that would cover my shoulder in case I bled through the bandage on it and some old sweatpants. I wasn't supposed to shower, so I just washed my face and rinsed my legs off in the tub. I was pretty scraped up from sliding across the gravel roof the way I had, but those weren't very deep. They were all scabbed over already and would be gone by morning. 

I brushed my teeth and went out to the living room to put in the movie so it would be ready when Steve got back. I heard my phone ding, so I went into the kitchen to see I had several missed messages from Natasha.

Nat:How are you feeling? 

Nat: Are you home yet?

Nat: You didn't break up with Rogers already just because he acted like an idiot, did you?

I could see her saying that and it made me chuckle. 

Me: We're not dating. I'm not sure it's wise to date someone I work with.

Nat: Why?

Me: You heard what he said today. If that's how he's going to be when we're on missions, I'm only going to be a detriment to the team.

My offer to Maria was still on the table. If Steve couldn't handle being in the field with me, it wouldn't be in our best interest to start dating. Natasha's answer came quickly and I could tell she didn't like the direction I was heading.

Nat: We couldn't have done it without you today. Yes I could have went but then we wouldn't have made it in time.

Me: Thx. How do you and Clint not have this problem?

Nat: I threatened to shoot him if he ever acted like an overprotective boyfriend on a mission.

I laughed. I didn't know her very well yet, but I could see her doing that and Clint saying. 'Sorry – don't shoot me. I won't do it again.' However, I didn't think I could do that to Captain America and still have a job.

Me: He's NOT my bf. 

Nat: Yet. 

I tossed my phone aside, ready to be done with this conversation when another message from her came through. I argued with myself briefly, but finally looked at it. 

Nat: He's from the 40's and you aren't. Communication issues are going to happen.

True, that was going to be something we would have to deal with as it happened. That wasn't really my primary concern, though. I hesitated to send this one, knowing it would open a different can of worms.

Me: He thinks I'm Peggy.

Her response was quick and succinct.

Nat:Shit

Me: I'm not her. I don't know what to do. 

I sent that and thought for a moment before typing again. 

Me: Maybe I should still work with a different team for a while.

Nat: I don't think he's going to go for that. Seeing you go down right in front of him messed with his mind in a bad way so let him be near you and see that you're fine. 

Me: K. He's here now. Ttyl

 

* * *

Steve's POV

I went back to my apartment and quickly showered and brushed my teeth. Natasha had tried to call and left me a couple picture messages while I was showering. She must have been taking them without me paying attention over the past couple days. She'd snapped one of them right after Tony had sat down next to me on the way home from Kuwait with Sarah laying across us. The other one wasn't a bad picture either, I was touching Sarah's face right before her boxing match with Tony. I didn't want to talk to her right now, so I texted back a response so she knew I got her pictures.

Me: Thanks for the pictures. It's a little creepy how many you've taken without me knowing. 

Her response was a picture of me watching Sarah spar with Clint. She was right, I really needed to work on my poker face. Anyone seeing this wouldn't have a single doubt how I felt about Sarah. 

Me: Night, Nat. I'm going to watch a movie with Sarah now.

Her reply was a string of little pictures she knew I still didn't understand - which was exactly why she sent them. I finished getting dressed in sweatpants and a soft shirt and headed back over to Sarah's. She'd already changed and put in the movie, tapping at her phone as she sat on to the couch under her Captain America blanket. I hit the lights and pulled my phone out as I went to sit on her left. 

"Natasha sent me a message, but I don't speak hieroglyphics. Do you think you could translate for me?" I pulled up her message and handed my phone to Sarah, who read it and started laughing.

"What? Is it a joke?"

"Noooo, I didn't figure Natasha for an emoji kind of person. These little pictures are usually used to add to a conversation, but my friend Chloe uses them as a conversation sometimes. It reads, 'Ok America. Take a shower, have some popcorn tonight with the movie. Enjoy your vacation, call later.' Does she send you these a lot?" I could see her scroll up to find more, but she stopped at the pictures, tapping them and making them larger.

"I just got those from her a little bit ago," I said nervously, not knowing what she would think of them.

She glanced up at me. "These are really good. I can't believe she caught these on camera! Can I send them to myself?"

I nodded, relieved she wasn't upset about it. "Sure. Nat likes taking pictures of the team without us noticing." She tapped a couple times and heard her phone buzz when they arrived. She handed me back my phone and I set it on the coffee table.

"What were you and Tony talking about? I'm guessing that was taken on the way home today," she looked over at me speculatively.

"You. Tony was asking about you. I was trying to hold pressure and keep your shoulder elevated. Easier said than done."

"I look like I'm just sleeping, the way you're holding me." I looked at it closer over her shoulder.

"Yeah, I guess it does," I said. If you didn't know what to look for, it did look like she was sleeping, her face turned to me. "You gave me quite the scare today, Sarah. I watched you go down and all I could think of was that the last words we'd said to each other before the mission were said in anger." My voice was rough, and I glanced at her as I cleared my throat, seeing her lips part in surprise. "I thought...I was afraid...I was retrieving your body...to bring it home."

"I'm so sorry, Steve." She scooted closer and laid her head on my shoulder. "I should have known how that would affect you because of who I look like. Thank you for coming to get me, stabilizing me, everything."

I put my arms around her, carefully pulling her into my lap, trying not to jar her or hold her too firmly. The feeling of having her in my arms again, this time awake and so vibrantly alive, brought me back to myself, grounding me again. I hadn't felt so strongly about anything else in this time, just her. 

"I knew you were there," she said quietly. "While I was unconscious. I could feel your heartbeat and talking sometimes."

"I'll always be there for you, Sarah." I stroked her cheek with my thumb, cupping her face with the palm of my hand. I leaned in and kissed her gently, the feel of her soft lips under mine exactly what I needed right now. She was here and she was alive, nothing else mattered. When she kissed me like this, I didn't believe that she wasn't attracted to me. We didn't stop kissing until we were both breathless, and she tucked her head into the crook of my neck, her hand on my heart, feeling it racing under her palm.

"Are you ready for the movie?"

"Sure," she slid off my lap to pick up the remote and hit play before settling next to me, resting her head on my arm. 

"It's a good thing I heal fast," she said with a yawn. "I hate getting shot."

"How long will it take you to heal from this?"

"I lost a lot of blood, so it'll take a little longer than normal, but I should be almost as good as new by Sunday. I'll be able to use my arm by Friday."

I kissed the top of her head and smiled. It wasn't very long into the movie before she was sleeping. I shifted her so she was laying on me, being careful not to hurt her. I can't say I paid much attention to the movie as I held her, breathing in her scent, feeling her warm body on mine. 

I still hadn't processed all that had passed through my head when I watched that bullet go through her. I understood why I couldn't have went under cover with her on this one – I was recognized on sight almost world wide now - I was a liability. She could - and did - blend in better than I ever could. This whole mission had depended on her being able to go in and do what needed to be done. 

The rest of my teammates knew I respected their abilities; Sarah deserved the same consideration. We were soldiers in a new kind of war – there was always the chance that some of us wouldn't be coming back alive. I enjoyed spending down time with my teammates and I counted them as my friends. I would miss them if they were gone, but I would be able to move on.

If I lost Sarah, though, you might as well kill me too, because I didn't want to be somewhere she wasn't. It was strange to feel this powerfully about someone I had only known for a couple days, but she was unlike anyone I had ever met, even Peggy.  
Sarah's POV

I woke up as the credits started to roll. I didn't remember falling asleep in this position, so he must have moved me after I fell asleep. I was still tired, but I needed to move around for a little bit so I didn't get stiff. Steve felt me wake up and helped me to climb off him and stand up.

"Are you going in tomorrow?" I asked him as I stretched, yawning. He shook his head. 

"No, we usually get the day off after a mission, so you're stuck with me."

"Fury told you to keep an eye on me, didn't he?" I asked dryly, watching his cheeks flush slightly.

Steve rubbed the back of his neck and laughed. "Maybe, but I thought we could do something together if you felt up to it tomorrow."

"Really? What?"

"It's a surprise."

I raised my eyebrow and grinned. "You can tell me now and I'll act surprised tomorrow."

He snorted. "Nice try." I pouted and he laughed at the silly face I made. He stood up and was going to leave me. "Time for bed, missy. I'll see you in the morning."

"Okay," I said, agreeing with him. I wasn't going to sleep great tonight no matter what, so I didn't want to keep him up as well. "Will you help me with my ice packs before you go?"

"Sure. What do you want me to do?"

"I'll get everything I need first. It'll take me a couple minutes."

He nodded and I went to the kitchen to get two ice packs out of the freezer for my shoulder and a glass of water for my nightstand, taking them into my room with me. I set the ice packs on the bed and climbed on the chair I used to reach the top shelves in my closet, looking for my extra pillows when Steve's voice startled me as he came into my bedroom, almost making me fall off the chair. 

"Sarah, what are you doing?"

"Having a heart attack! You scared me."

"Get down, Sarah," Steve ordered, sounding unamused.

"I'm just getting stuff out of my closet, Steve. Give me a moment." I turned to look at his unamused expression. He set both hands around my waist and lifted me off the chair, setting me on the floor, my weight not even affecting him. I know my waist wasn't that small, but his hands almost completely spanned it.

"How about you tell me what you want and I'll grab it for you," he suggested. "Before you hurt yourself."

"Where's the fun in that?" I grumbled. 

"What were you trying to reach?" He asked as he tucked a loose curl behind my ear. I got the impression that he wasn't planning on leaving until he was certain I was set for the night, so I gave in. 

"Fine, I was trying to grab my extra pillows. It'll feel better when I'm not laying flat on my back. I've been shot there before." 

"I don't know what to say to that," Steve said as he reached up, pulling down two more pillows and setting them on the bed.

"You made that look easy, you know."

He grinned endearingly, "I know."

I piled up the pillows on the bed. Reaching in my nightstand, I pulled out an Ace bandage and tossed it to Steve before I took off the sling, discarding it on the chair. 

"I need you to wrap these ice packs so they'll stay put." I held the front pack so he could get it started winding the wrap firmly around me.

"Are you in pain right now?" he asked as he worked,

"It's starting to throb." I admitted. "I'll take some painkillers after you leave; they gave me some Percocet at Shield. It'll take the edge off for a while, maybe long enough for me to fall asleep."

Steve gently placed the second pack on my back before winding the rest of the wrap around me firmly enough to hold them in place. "All set?" I nodded, feeling the cold seeping through my shirt. I went to my duffle bag and pulled out a bottle of pills. I took four with water and turned on my lamp so I could read for a bit before going to sleep. 

"So is there anything you need to do tomorrow since you have an extra day off?" Steve asked as we walked to the living room.

"Just laundry. You were going to show me your place, remember?" I yawned. "So what's the surprise tomorrow?"

"That's for me to know and you to find out."

I laughed at his use of the quip. "Wow, are we five now?"

"Nope, it's one of Tony's favorite sayings. I thought it seemed fitting."

"Somehow I'm not really surprised by that; he still calls you Capsicle, after all."

"I'll call you in the morning, okay?" He leaned down to kiss me, and I knew he really wanted to stay, but felt it would be more proper for him to leave. I wasn't going to argue with him tonight.

"Sure. What time are you thinking?"

"Eight. That way you can sleep in if you want."

"Hmm, I want," I said as I went up on tiptoe to kiss him goodnight, closing the door behind him. 

I noticed Steve had tidied the living room while I'd been getting my ducks in a huddle and I smiled to myself at his neat-freak tendencies. I picked up my phone from the coffee table and took it with me into my room to plug it in, turning off my alarms. I got into bed and turned off my lamp, the Percocet kicking in already and pulling me towards sleep. 

* * 

The sun was shining through my windows when I woke up the next morning. My clock said 7:30; I never slept that late. I sat up and pulled the mushy ice packs off my shoulder; the wrap had loosened overnight, so I slid it off and stood up. I moved my arm carefully, wincing as the stitches pulled slightly. I really wanted a shower, but I would settle for a bath right now. Most of my scrapes were healed and I needed to scrub myself to get all the loose skin off.

I ran myself a nice bubble bath and even washed my hair, trying not to get the gauze wet. I thought I did pretty good, all things considered. I dried off and wound my hair in a towel. I brushed my teeth and hair, wincing when the brush hit my goose egg, letting it hang over my good shoulder for now. Digging through my dresser, I finally found a front close racer-back bra that I could get on by myself and put on a tank top and loose capris. My legs were still too yucky looking for shorts today. By tomorrow, I wouldn't be able to tell anymore where the scrapes had been. 

Once I was dressed, I unwound the guaze from my forearm to look at the wound. It was starting to close, but it would be another day or two before it was completely healed. I carefully peeled the gauze off the front of my shoulder. That wound was about the size of a nickel, but it looked like it was starting to heal, at least. I'm sure it had looked a lot worse before the bleeding had stopped. I took some peroxide and a cotton pad and cleaned up the edges before putting a large band-aid over it. It wasn't seeping, so that was all I would need there.

I heard my phone ringing as I reached back to pull the gauze off of the exit wound and went to go grab it. "Hey, Steve."

"Hey Sarah. You're up already?"

"Couldn't sleep any longer. I got cleaned up and I'm already dressed unless I need to wear something specific for today's adventure."

"Nothing special today. I'll be right over if you're ready to go."

"I'm ready; I'm just changing my bandages if you'd be willing to help me with the back one. I can't quite reach it."

"I'll be right there. Bye."

I smiled to myself as I walked to the door to unlock it. He was there by the time I had the door open and walked in, giving me a once over. I checked him out while he was looking at me. His jeans fit him perfectly and his Under Armor t-shirt hinted at the well defined muscles I knew were there, the sleeves barely fitting his biceps. He was wearing a Shield baseball cap, which didn't look bad on him; I just wasn't used to seeing him in a hat.

"You look like you feel a lot better today."

"I do," I said with a smile. "Amazing how much difference a day makes."

I led him to the bathroom and gave him my back so he could finish peeling the tape and gauze off. There was a decent amount of blood on it and I turned to look at my shoulder in the mirror, seeing it for the first time.

"This one looks a lot better," Steve said, meeting my eyes in the mirror. "It looked horrible when I first saw it."

"I believe you. Dr Blake said the bullet spun after glancing off my bone and that's why the exit wound was so nasty."

"If you hadn't turned when you did, it would have went through your heart."

I nodded and handed him the peroxide soaked cotton pad. "I got lucky, then."

The actual hole itself was about as big as a quarter. It looked like there were around a dozen stitches holding my skin in place where it had torn to let the bullet out. I was surprised there wasn't more damage. It had scabbed over for the most part, but it was still seeping a bit around the edges. 

"If you can get the worst of it off; I have large band-aids to put over it for now." I turned so he would be able to see it better. I felt his warm hands gently working around the wound to clean my skin off and apply the new bandage. 

"All done."

"Why thank you, Nurse. How are your hairdressing skills, by the way?" I arched an eyebrow at him in the mirror.

"I think I can manage something," he grinned, taking the elastic I offered him. 

"Maybe a ponytail?" I asked as I handed him my brush. It took him a couple tries, but he managed to pull my hair back into a ponytail and wrapped the elastic around it. I handed him another elastic band and twisted the tail into a bun, letting him tuck it into the second elastic. 

"Well, I'm ready for the day now. What's on the agenda?" I went to go get my sling; at least today I only looked like I'd had shoulder surgery.

"Breakfast."

"You're cooking?"

"I'm driving."

"Okay - lead on." I grabbed my wallet, shoving it in my pocket. I tossed Steve my keys and slipped on a pair of comfy flats, before grabbing my phone and following Steve out while he locked our doors. 

* * * 

Steve's POV

"Can I open them?" Sarah asked, reaching for the blindfold.

"In a minute," I said, pulling her hand away from the blindfold. I got out of the car and went around to open her door, helping her get out by giving good directions. I looped my arm through her good one, getting her into position. "Now you can look."

I pulled off the blindfold and she opened her eyes to see the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. 

"I haven't been here since I was a kid!" she said, a huge smile on her beautiful face as she looked up at me and reached up on her tiptoes and give me a kiss. "I love it! Best surprise ever."

"Really?" I could feel my cheeks getting warm and knew I was flushed.

"Yup. I'm a total nerd," Sarah said, still grinning. "I love going to museums! Ask my parents about what I wanted for birthday presents as a kid."

"I will, then," I said, delighted that she was enjoying the surprise. 

We went inside and made our way through the various exhibits hand in hand, looking at everything. We had the whole day, after all. We argued the merits of different aircraft and discussed the various things I had missed while I was in the Arctic. 

For being a weekday the museum was still pretty busy; the most popular place in the building was definitely the last exhibit we went to; the one on Captain America.


	12. Competition

Sarah's POV

I indulged my inner geek and read through every panel. 'The story of Captain America was one of honor, bravery and sacrifice,' said the commentator over the speakers as it started a well thought out script that played at each panel. In essence, it was a timeless theme – an underdog turned larger than life hero in time to save the world from evil.

They had a nice part about each of the Howling Commandos and an admirable eulogy for Bucky. On another wall, clips of the many propaganda films he made during the war played on a loop. I smiled at how serious he looked in all of them. Steve put his arm around me and murmured how the director kept telling them not to look at the camera and how silly he had felt doing those until he saw one in person with an American audience as a newsreel forerunner to a weekly film and he saw how people responded to Captain America. It was then that he realized that Cap was a symbol of hope to the American public. 

There was even a comic book about his efforts against Hydra, which he said was relatively true. I said I had a copy of it at home and he laughed. There were quite a few old photos of him with groups of soldiers. They had made their way all around Europe in pursuit of Hydra and it had always surprised him that even in the field, he could see how the regular Joe's would perk up when he and the Commandos visited a new camp. 

There was an old film clip with Steve and Bucky and it captured how close they had been. I was amazed at how much my friend Jace resembled his great-uncle. They had some of the same expressions and mannerisms. That part of the exhibit made Steve quiet for a bit and I knew he was missing his best friend.

I could see why he chose to wear the ball cap today, some of the kids realized who he was. I saw Steve smile and put his finger to his lips more than once as we wandered through the exhibit, acknowledging them and silently asking them to play along. Wide-eyed, they nodded and smiled, content to play the game with him, for the most part.

I noticed a little blond girl in a t-shirt with Cap's shield on it, probably only around 5 or so years old, who kept staring at him, wide-eyed. She got away from her mom and ran up to him, latching on to his knees, which startled Steve for a moment since he hadn't seen her until then. Her mom apologized to us and tried to peel her off. I said it was fine and crouched down to have a whispered conversation with her. "Can I help you, sweetie?"

"He's Captain America. I know it."

"Yes, he is. It's his day off today, so he's not wearing his suit. Would you like a picture with him?" Her face lit up and she nodded.

"Yes, please! He's my favoritest hero ever!" I smiled and stood up, looking at Steve.

"She wants a photo with you, Grant. She thinks you look like Captain America." He grinned down at her and said, "Sure thing, doll. What's your name?" 

"Clara."

Her mom got her phone out to take a picture, but I said I'd do it for her. The crowd had thinned momentarily, so we went over in front of the life size Commandos and I positioned Steve so they were fanned out behind him and had him pick Clara up. I took one of just the two of them with my phone while I was waiting for Clara's mom to get in the picture, standing by Steve's side. I snapped a couple on her phone to make sure I got a good one. It turned out great. The kid was beaming, her mom was pretty, and Steve had a genuine smile on his face.

Clara smacked a kiss on Steve's cheek and gave his neck a good squeeze while I gave her mom her phone back. He set her down as her mom thanked us again and they went to check out the rest of the exhibit.

* * *

Steve's POV

"Looks like I have competition," Sarah laughed as she showed me the picture she'd taken of us. I think I smiled, but my mind was a long ways away. The old me thought a wife and children was something I should have by now; most men my age did back in my time. I'd planned on asking Peggy on a date and if things worked out, but all that had changed when I'd buried that plane in the ice. 

I shook off the funk I'd fallen into when Sarah begged me to take a photo of her with skinny pre-serum Steve, her expression making me laugh. She was taller and weighed more than I did back then. Now I had 85 pounds and roughly 6 inches on her. I watched her looking at my health history before Project Rebirth, smiling when she asked me quite seriously, "Did you even get to leave the house growing up? I don't know how you made it to adulthood." We moved over by the wall, out of the flow of the crowd.

My lips quirked as I remembered how things were before I had this new, improved body. "A lot of the time, I didn't get to leave our apartment. My asthma was horrible and the soot filled city air didn't help. There wasn't a lot they could do back then for asthma; I would just have to fight for every breath until my lungs decided to cooperate with me again. As for the rest, if it wasn't for Bucky, I probably wouldn't have made it to adulthood. I was always getting into fights that he would have to drag me out of." 

"Did you have something against running away?" Sarah asked, and suddenly I wasn't sure if I was looking at Sarah or Peggy anymore. I froze and she turned to look up at me. "Steve? Are you okay? Steve?" I felt a small hand on my arm.

I took a deep breath, "Peggy...said that...to me. On our way to the lab for the procedure." I felt my chest tighten, and I suddenly missed Peggy more than anything.

She took my hand and pulled me over to an alcove with a bench a little ways away, a hand on my shoulder pushing me to sit down. It turned out the bench was there so people could see a short video. I sat there and watched Peggy talking about me, just taking her in. I'd missed hearing Peggy's soft British tones, her crisp pronunciation of my name.

Out of habit, I took out the compass I always carried, flipping it open to see the picture of Peggy I'd cut out from a newspaper and put in the cover. I shut it and turned it over and over in my hands as I watched the entire video.

* * *

Sarah's POV

I don't know how long we sat there while I watched him watch her, a small piece of metal in his hand the whole time. Peggy's British voice was nice to listen to and there was no doubt in my mind that even though she had went on living her life after he went into the ice, she had never stopped loving Steve Rogers. The war had ended less than 4 months after Steve took out Hydra. Had he been there, he would have married Peggy then and maybe had kids of his own. I looked at the picture of him and Clara, trying to see what he saw when he looked at it. With her blond curls and bright blue eyes, she could have passed for his kid. My heart hurt for him as I knew he was thinking about the chance he'd lost.

I surreptitiously snapped a photo of Steve and sent it to Natasha along with a text, You have some explaining to do. What part of this seemed like a good idea? I knew this hadn't been Steve's idea, Natasha had to have told him about it. 

After the video ended and looped through for the third time, I stood up and put my hand on Steve's shoulder. His cobalt eyes finally focused on me and he stood up to follow me back to the exhibit. On our way out of the screening area, I was looking back at him and tripped over something. My feet were tangled up so I couldn't move them, I started falling forward, off balance. I would have fallen hard if a man hadn't caught me as I collided with his chest. Pain screamed down my arm at the impact and tears came to my eyes. The man had realized I was injured and didn't move me, just holding me in place as Steve put his hands around my waist and lifted me up to set me back on my feet. My legs were tangled in a gold rope – the kind used to block off exhibits – that had been knocked off its hook somehow.

"Are you okay, miss?" the man asked as I carefully stepped out of the ropes.

I knew that voice. I took a couple deep breaths, waiting for the pain to subside and blinked back the tears, looking up at the handsome dark skinned man with close cropped hair. "Sam? Sam Wilson? Is that you?"

"Sarah Evans?"

I threw my good arm around his torso and hugged him fiercely. "I haven't seen you in forever, man. Where have you been? Steve, this is a friend from back home, Sam Wilson."

"Coincidentally, we've already met." He shook Sam's hand and smiled. "We run the same route in the mornings. Thanks for catching her, Sam. I was too far away to break her fall."

"Any time. What did you do to your arm, Sarah?"

"I'll tell you over lunch. Care to join us?"

"Hell yeah. I'm always hungry."

A worker was coming to take care of the rope and pole that I had tripped on. I assured her I was fine and we left the exhibit.

We walked down to the food court, making small talk about the planes we passed on the way. Steve got us pizza and Sam went for McDonald's while I found us an out of the way table so we could talk. I sat down and relaxed, looking at my bandages to make sure I hadn't started bleeding again. I hadn't hit directly on my bad shoulder, so I was fine; I didn't think I tore any stitches. Hitting Sam was almost like hitting Steve. They both were pretty solid. I waited until they were both seated before starting my interrogation.

"So what are you doing in DC? I thought you were over in Afghanistan. Why haven't you called? Where's Ry?"

"Slow down, Pooka!" he cut me off, waving a fry at me. "I'm not going anywhere for a while. You first. What did you do now?"

"I got shot." 

"Again?"

"Again. And you better not tell Mama Dee because then she'll tell my mom and I'll never hear the end of it."

"I ain't gonna tell Mama nothing; credit me with more sense than that!"

"Our moms work at the same hospital on the same weekend rotation." I explained to Steve. "Mama Dee is my second mom, I swear. Sam used to pick me up from school when my parents couldn't and he was home on leave. And it isn't like I tried to get shot."

"Seriously, who tries to get shot?" Sam mused. Steve chuckled at our argument/conversation.

"It just kind of happened. We were running this undercover op and I was on my way out when a sniper takes a crack at me. One of the team took him out, but I went down. Steve got me to the bird and helped patch me up."

Sam nodded to Steve. "Thanks, man, for looking out for her. She's really something special."

Steve smiled, "Always. Can't imagine the team without her."

"Now you." I said to Sam, taking a bite of pizza.

"Well, after 16 years, I decided it was time to be done."

"So what do you do here?"

"I work at the VA as a counselor. Got a fancy degree and everything. I mostly help vets adjust to being civilians again. Some of them were in some pretty hot spots for their whole tour and that leaves a mark on a person. A lot of them have some PTSD; it's hard to go from just trying to stay alive to being a regular working class American."

"Wow. I'm so proud of you! I knew you could do it. So did Ry stay in after you got out?

"I'm sorry to have to tell you this, Sarah..." Sam's face fell, and I knew what he was going to say.

"No. No. No! I'm so sorry Sam. How – " I choked out. Steve ran his hand down my back in sympathy.

"We were flying a night mission, standard PJ rescue op, nothing we hadn't done a thousand times before until an RPG knocked Riley's dumb ass out of the sky. Nothing I could do. It was like I was up there just to watch."

"Damn, Sam. That's rough." I reached over and squeezed his arm. "I guess he got his way after all. That was how he always wanted to go out; fighting for the red, white, and blue."

"Yeah, I know. He told us that a million times."

"So his wings didn't fail him?"

"No, so don't you be telling yourself that, Pooka! Those wings were the best thing that could have happened to us."

"I'll have to show you pictures later, Steve, but Sam and Riley were test pilots for a new kind of wings I helped develop. I had to find someone who would be willing to test them before the Air Force would pay to fabricate them, so I called up Sam and his best friend to ask them how crazy they were."

"Best phone call of my life." Sam tapped at his phone and slid it over to Steve.

"After you realized I was serious."

"Who takes a 13 year old serious?"

"I was 12, Sam. Get your story straight."

"That sounds even crazier. You were 12 then? Why did I listen to you again?"

"Because you love me."

"These really fly?" asked Steve, handing it back, interrupting our banter.

"Handle like a dream," Sam said. "As long as you aren't a 80 pound weakling." 

I smiled and leaned back, ignoring Sam while I stretched. I was starting to get tired and my shoulder was aching again. Steve must have realized it because he started cleaning up our garbage.

"I should get you home. You probably need to ice that again by now."

"Yeah, it's starting to get to me." I stood up and gave Sam a hug. "I'm going back home for graduation this weekend, but since you're here in town you better call me sometime."

"Phone works both ways, Pooka," he said as he leaned down and hugged me back.

"Bye Sam. Nice seeing you again," said Steve, shaking Sam's hand. 

"You too, Steve."

 

* * *

Steve's POV

We made our way out to where I'd parked. I opened the door for Sarah and she climbed in, settling into the seat and leaning it back. I walked around and got in, looking over at her. She'd closed her eyes and her face was tight with pain. Jarring her shoulder like that couldn't have felt very good, no matter what she'd said earlier. I headed for home; we'd been here for several hours and she should rest for a bit. I looked over a couple minutes later to see that she was watching me with those big golden brown eyes, a slight smile on her lips when she saw me glance at her.

"Thanks for taking me out today, Steve." She laid her hand on my forearm. "It was great to get to do something different with you."

I glanced over at her and smiled. "You're welcome. I'm glad you had a good time."

"And you? Did you have a good day? It was probably a little strange to see all that unless you knew about it already."

I shrugged. "It was nice to see it from your perspective. Natasha told me that I should go check it out. I didn't know it was that big of an exhibit...I figured it was a few pictures, maybe some WWII artifacts, and something about Hydra. Nothing like that."

She laughed in disbelief. "That doesn't surprise me. You don't know the effect you have on people, do you?"

"I never really thought about it, I guess. Back then I was too busy trying to stop Hydra. I knew that some of the stuff the camera crews shot was going to be for propaganda, like my USO tour, but that wasn't why I did what I did. That wasn't why I was enhanced."

"That little girl back at the museum, you made her day, you know." I blushed but didn't respond, pretending to be absorbed by driving. "Do the kids always recognize you?"

"I guess they can see under the hat."

Her smile widened and she shook her head. "Maybe it's because they're looking for heroes. Although, if that's your idea of a disguise, I totally get why you couldn't be my pretend husband in Jahra."

I snorted at her mental leap. "Ha ha. So, Pooka? What's that about? Should I be worried about my competition?"

"Hah – no competition there! Sam's like the older brother I never had. I was 12 when I first met Sam and he was dating some Gypsy girl. At the time, I was competing in an huge invention contest. He said he was betting on me to win since I was a dark horse. She was along with that day; in her culture, a dark horse is called a pooka. I looked it up later and a pooka is usually depicted as a slightly evil fairy that takes horse form. Sam said that suited me even more since I was small, slightly evil – according to him – and could outrun him. So the nickname stuck."

"So how many times have you been shot?"

"Umm, I'll have to think about that and get back to you. How many times have you been shot?"

"Not quite apples to apples there; I spent two years on the European front - I lost count before the end of the war." I pulled into the garage at our apartment building. Sarah let herself out before I got to her door.

"Ready to show me how to run your machine? I really do need to do some laundry."

"Sure. I'll bring your basket over for you. Do you want to watch the next movie in that magic series with me?"

"Yeah. I might even stay awake for this one."

"I'll believe it when I see it." I grinned as I said it, taking the sting from my words because she had yet to stay awake through a movie with me. 

We picked up our mail and started up the stairs to our floor. When we reached her apartment, I unlocked it and she went to put everything she needed in her laundry basket before letting me pick it up. I waited for her to get whatever else she wanted and led her back to my apartment. 

My washer and dryer were a lot nicer than the ones in the basement. Sarah put in her first load and looked around my rooms. My apartment might be bigger, but hers certainly felt homier. The kitchen and bathroom were identical to hers, but there were open shelves between the kitchen and living room. It was clean; I didn't have a lot of personal items, other than my books. 

My TV and DVD player were hooked up in the living room. I had a nice large leather couch that I could stretch out on and not be hanging off the edges and a la-z-boy recliner. Sarah handed me the movie to put in before giving me the Ace bandage to hold her ice packs in place. She took off her sling and held the ice where she wanted it while I wound the length of fabric around her small frame. 

I put in the movie before coming back to lay down on the couch, semi-reclining and I pulled her to me, settling her on my lap so she could lean against me. She moved suddenly, rolling onto her hip and good arm so she could see my face. Over the past couple days, I had learned that she liked to look at me when she talked to me, studying me with her beautifully expressive eyes. I could tell she had something on her mind; I was sure she would mention it eventually.

"Are you all right?" Sarah asked, studying my eyes. "You seemed pretty shaken for a bit there back at the museum. I didn't mean to hit a nerve." 

My throat tightened again as I thought about what it had probably seemed like to her. I rubbed my other hand up and down her back absently.

"I don't know what happened. One moment I was in the museum with you and the next I was in the back seat of an SSR car on my way to becoming Captain America...the memory was just so vivid. This is going to sound stupid, but I could swear I heard Peggy talking to me."

"Not stupid at all - you did hear her, in a way," she gave me a small, sad smile that hit me like a punch to the gut. "We sat and watched a video of her talking about you for a while. I wasn't sure where you were mentally, but physically you were next to me the whole time."

I felt even worse; my response had hurt her. I'd originally wanted her to come with me to check out the exhibit for two reasons. The first was because I knew she'd enjoy it as a self proclaimed Cap fan; the second was a little harder to put into words, but I'd needed her to come with me because I knew I couldn't do it on my own. 

It'd been surreal, to an extent, seeing those pictures and videos that I remembered being present for and realizing that they had happened almost 70 years ago. Everyone else in those black and white photos was either really old or dead, except me - I was a 94 year old man in a 25 year old body. 

"Thank you for being there with me today, Sarah. You don't know how glad I am that you were there."

She gave me that sad smile again. "You still love Peggy."

It wasn't a question, so I swallowed hard, trying to get rid of the knot in my throat, and nodded. "I always will. I couldn't have done half of what I accomplished during the war without her support. She was my compass... my soul mate... I guess you could say. I regret a lot of things from back then – we were so busy trying to win the war that we didn't make the time to have a relationship. That was what we talked about doing after the war, going out to do things that civilian couples did." I paused for moment, thinking of how to say what I felt. Honesty was really my only option, I wouldn't lie to Sarah about this.

"I go to see Peggy sometimes, but it's not the same. She has dementia now; some days she knows what year it is and we have great conversations about back then and what's going on in the world now. Other days when I visit, it's like I just came back for the first time since 1945 and I have to watch her process me coming back to life. Those days I feel like I let her down."

Her golden brown eyes were suspiciously shiny and she blinked rapidly. "That would be hard to cope with." I nodded, the lump in my throat still choking me. She took a couple deep breaths before she continued. "You scared me today, Steve. You didn't know me, you didn't see me, you couldn't hardly speak. I didn't know what to do." 

A lone tear rolled down her face and I brushed it away with my thumb, my chest tightening painfully as I realized just how scared she'd been. She might be an incredibly competent agent, but underneath, she was still just an 18 year old girl. 

"You need to work with someone on this, like a real psychiatrist or something. Promise me you will see a professional about this. I can't go on missions with you if I'm going to inadvertently trigger painful memories. I won't compromise your safety or the team's safety like that." Her eyes were anguished – I hated seeing her like this and knowing that it was my fault.

I knew it was hard for her to tell me that; the truth was, I needed to hear it from her. She was right, I hadn't seen her or felt her. I didn't know Sarah was there because in my mind, Peggy was. It wasn't unreasonable for her to ask this of me, it was something I would have asked of her if the tables were turned. 

"I-I promise I will find someone to talk to about this. It might take a bit to find someone I will trust, so I want you to meet whoever it is beforehand."

"I would be happy to give you my impression of them, if that is what you are asking."

"Yes. I trust your read of people. You're pretty spot on."

"So you heard my report on the team to Maria the other day?" she groaned and flopped down on me, trying to hide her face in my neck. 

"Yup," I chuckled, "and I totally agree with your assessment."

"Did everyone hear?"

"Tony did."

"Kill me now..." she groaned, making me smile at her theatrics.

"Can't let that happen on my watch." 

I tipped her face up for a kiss. Her soft lips moved with mine as I deepened this kiss, stroking her tongue with mine. I reached up to cup her face and ran my hand down her back, stopping to hold onto her pert little butt and pull her up a little higher on me so her hip wasn't pressing so heavily on my throbbing erection. 

Our phones buzzed, mine in my front pocket between us, which didn't help my thin control at the moment, and she jumped slightly at the vibration, gasping. I felt her eyelashes brush my cheek for a moment before she slowly scooted back down me, unknowingly torturing me as she leaned over so she could reach her phone. 

It took a couple moments for my pulse to slow and I reached into my pocket to pull out my phone. It wasn't a mission; it was a group text from Natasha.


	13. Za Vstrechu

Sarah's POV  


I stared at my phone, slightly puzzled as to what was going on. Steve looked just as confused. "Did we make plans while I was high on painkillers yesterday?" I asked Steve and his face cleared.

"Uh, no, it's Thursday. Team movie night at Stark's house here in DC."

"Ok, then. Do I need to dress up? How long does it take to get there?"

"No, what you're wearing is fine; I'm not changing. It's about 20 minutes from here, give or take. We eat first and then watch whatever Pepper has picked out."

"Sounds fun!" The washer toned, indicating my load was ready for the dryer. I climbed off Steve and went to switch out my loads. It was already almost 5, so I would have time to finish my last load before we had to leave.

"It's certainly never dull, I guess."

"Do we need to bring anything?"

"Just ourselves. Tony gets insulted if we do anything other than bring our own alcohol."

"Do we need alcohol?" 

He thought that over for a bit, "Probably wouldn't be a bad idea, now that I think of it. We'll pick something up on the way, then, if you're all right with that."

"Sure. You're buying." I started the dryer and began putting the rest of the clothes into the washer.

"If I get carded, you can't laugh at their reactions to my birthday."

"What is your birthday?"

"July 4th."

"What year?"

"Every year." I couldn't see him, but I could hear the smile in his voice.

"Seriously, Steve! How long have you been using that line?"

"1918."

"July 4th. Could you be any more patriotic, Captain America?" I laughed as I started the washer and came back into the living room as he groaned. "At least my stealth suit isn't red, white and blue."

"It's only missing the red, well it was – until I bled on it yesterday – so nope, still pretty patriotic." I grinned as he rolled his eyes at me.

"What do you want to do for an hour, then? We can start the movie, but since we're going to be watching one later we can do something else."

"Do you want to go walk in the park? I know you probably run there in the mornings, but it's too beautiful of a day to stay inside."

"Sure, let me grab my sunglasses and take these ice packs off. They're starting to get mushy already." I started winding up the Ace wrap and let Steve finish taking it off. I took off my sling and tossed it on the couch. He put the ice packs in his freezer while I grabbed my sunglasses off my table.

"Wow, it was a great day to take a walk in the park. I can't say I've ever been so leisurely there before." I sniffed the flowers he had bought from a florist's stall. Steve had surprised me with the brightly colored arrangement when we had stopped to admire the beautiful displays the shopkeeper had out. 

"Me either. It was nice to do something out of the ordinary." Steve unlocked his door and I followed him in. The dryer was done, so I emptied it out into my basket and put the next load in to dry. Most of my clothes didn't need folding, so I wasn't worried about doing that right then, but Steve was clearly a tidier person than I was, since he took the basket into the bedroom and dumped it on the bed.

"I know it's hard to fold things one handed. I can help you do that so your clothes don't get wrinkled."

"I hate folding laundry. You can help me do that anytime; just let me sort out the stuff that doesn't need to be folded and you can have at it." His face flushed as he realized what I meant. I tossed my bras and underwear back in my basket; I never folded them anyway. 

"Were you really not going to fold any of this?" he asked incredulously.

"Only the jeans and my nice shirts. Most of what I wear in the summer is stuff like this – tank tops and shorts. Do you fold all of your clothes?"

His blush gave him away even though he wasn't going to answer. I opened his closet to see it perfectly organized by type and color. I looked at him with wide eyes and a devilish smirk. "Boy, either you've spent way too much time in the army or you need a life. This isn't normal for a single guy in this time." I went back over to him and stood on my tiptoes to give him a kiss. "'I know you're straight, so that's not it." I felt him grin as worked my way down his neck. He leaned down slightly to allow me easier access.

"You're sure?" He chuckled. I ran my hand down his side and rested it firmly on his already rigid length. It twitched against my hand and he drew in a tight breath, muscles tensing.

"Absolutely positive." I smiled, meeting his eyes.

He groaned and recaptured my lips, and I ran my hand up under his shirt, letting my fingers play on his well defined abs. His skin shivered under my touch, even though it felt hot under my questing fingers. 

The quiet, breathy noises he made were intoxicating to me; knowing that I could make him feel this way emboldened me. His hands were on my hips, thumbs drawing small circles on my belly. My tank top had rode up and I felt the heat of his hands seep into my skin. My skin was already sensitized and it skittered under the rough pads of his thumbs. It felt so good, I inadvertently shivered, gasping and tensing when pain shot down my arm. I rested my forehead on Steve's chest and closed my eyes, waiting for it to pass.

"Sarah, are you okay?"

"Yeah," I breathed, "Just moved wrong." He kissed the top of my head and ran his hands down my back until I relaxed. "I'm going to go get a drink of water."

He let me go and I went into the kitchen to find a glass. I ran the tap until it was cold and filled my glass. I shut off the tap and chugged it down, taking a moment to cool off. The clock said 6, so I figured I should probably get ready to go. I kind of felt like I needed a cold shower, too. I set my empty glass in the sink and walked back into Steve's bedroom. He had piled my clothes into my basket and was sitting on the bed, lost in thought. 

"It's 6 already, so I'm going to go change before we need to leave."

He looked up at me and smiled. "Sure. Just let yourself back in when you're ready to go."

"Okay."

* * *  
Steve's POV

I heard the door click shut and took a deep breath. I had never felt so attracted to a woman that I completely lost my control before. There was no doubt in my mind that if she hadn't pulled back, we would have continued as far as she wanted to go. I was more than happy to let her lead, up to a point. Just making out left me hard as steel. Sarah pressing her hand on me had almost sent me over the edge. I hadn't planned on changing before we left, but I really needed a cold shower right now. I quickly stripped, tossing the clothes in my hamper, and turned on the water, leaving it just short of warm. I stepped in and leaned on the shower wall, letting the cold water roll over me bringing me back to myself. When I was finally flaccid, I turned off the water and stepped out, drying off quickly. I put on deodorant and gave myself a light squirt of cologne. I had noticed Sarah liked the scent I normally wore, which made me smile. 

Walking back into my bedroom, I pulled on fresh boxers, jeans and a soft shirt. I knew the dryer was probably done, so I brought the load into my room and folded them, setting them in the basket. This load was mostly towels, so it didn't take me very long. I took the basket into the living room and noticed the flowers sitting on the table. I knew I had a large enough glass somewhere that they would fit in, so I searched until I found it and filled it with water. I put the arrangement in the glass and set it back on the table. I heard Sarah's door shut and was pulling on my shoes when she came in. She had changed into a pair of jean shorts that showed off her long, toned legs and a short sleeved v-neck t-shirt that clung nicely to her slender frame.

"Ready?" she asked, tossing me her keys.

"Yes." I stood up and followed her out the door, tucking my phone, keys, and wallet in my pockets.

I pulled into the private driveway of Tony's DC house and waited for the gates to open. Sarah's eyes were wide as she took it all in. It was a huge two story red brick mansion with white columns in front. Tasteful landscaping surrounded the house and there was at least an acre of lawn. We got out of the car and I grabbed the bag of alcohol we had picked out. I took Sarah's hand in mind and pulled her towards the house. 

"Wait until you see the inside," I stage whispered and she grinned at me. We walked in the front door and kicked off our shoes. I took Sarah to the kitchen where everyone who was there already was gathered.

"What did you bring me?" asked Natasha, taking the bag from me.

"Only the good stuff."

"Damn, Rogers, you know your way to an assassin's heart. Sarah, you have to try this!" Natasha pulled out the bottle of Tovaritch vodka.

"Is it going to poison me?" Sarah raised a brow at her.

"Depends on how much you drink." Natasha smirked. It was a good thing I was driving if Natasha wanted a drinking partner

"Set me up, sister. I brought my own DD." Sarah patted my arm and grinned. We took a seat at the island as Natasha went to go find shot glasses. Clint walked into the kitchen and punched my arm before waving at Sarah.

"Hey kid. You're looking a lot better today."

"I certainly feel a lot better. Still hate getting shot, but I'll be good as new in a couple days."

"Good. Have a nice day off?"

"Yup – slept in, ate a big breakfast, went for a walk, did some laundry- all those things ya gotta do every now and again."

"I'd still be sleeping if I got to sleep in." Sarah laughed, not knowing that Clint was telling the truth. On off days he didn't get up unless someone made him. I never knew a person could sleep so much.

Tony came in with a bottle of wine. "Hey Capsicle, glad you could make it. Hello Sarah, what do you think of my place? Supper will be ready in 20 minutes according to Mario." 

"Hi Tony. It's great; I love this kitchen! It's like it came right out of Better Homes and Gardens. I wouldn't have guessed this was yours."

Natasha set the shot glasses on the counter-top and filled them with vodka. Everyone took a glass and raised it. "Za vstrechu!" she toasted.

"Za vstrechu!" we chorused. Natasha had once said it meant 'to our meeting,' which seemed appropriate. We clinked our glasses and threw the liquor back. I didn't mind this vodka; it was smooth and peppery and didn't feel like it was searing my throat. 

"Not bad," said Sarah. "It's better than most of the vodkas I've tried."

"Hey Sarah," said Tony, "if you have a minute can you re-wrap me? I just felt it come loose again and Bruce isn't here yet."

"Sure," she said, standing up. "Did you lose the fasteners?"

"I can't tell, they were around back from when Happy did it. I have more in my lab, though; I think. Jarvis, where did I put those little fastener things?"

"They are in your lab on your desk, sir." 

"Thanks, J. I'll follow you then, Tony. I have no idea where that is."

They walked out of the room and I stood up to get a glass for my scotch. 

"So you and Evans, Steve?" asked Clint.

"What about it? I just drove her here since she shouldn't be driving yet and she didn't know where this place was."

"Cut the crap, Steve. You can't keep your eyes off her and you have a little hickey on your neck." He tapped the base of my neck and I felt myself flush. I hadn't looked in the mirror earlier since I had been in such a hurry.

"Okay, so I like her...a lot. What's not to like?" Opening the bottle, I poured myself a generous glass. "She's smart, funny and beautiful."

"Pay up Nat."

"I can't believe you got him to admit it. He was so far in denial he might as well have been in Egypt."

"So I take it you two don't have any objections?"

"Nope," said Clint, meeting my eyes. "It's about time you finally showed interest in a female. She seems like she's got a good head on her shoulders."

 

"She does," I said with a smile.

"And she's just as much a virgin as you are," said Natasha, pouring herself another vodka. I felt my face flush and tried to cut her off before she got rolling on this topic. Natasha was having none of it, determined to get her say in. "She's got Tony drooling and he knows he doesn't have a prayer of getting her."

"Not helping, Nat." I groaned, desperately trying not to picture her with Stark.

"I think she'll be good for you as long as you don't pull any more crap like you did yesterday. She had every right to object to you treating her like a rookie kid."

"You heard us arguing?"

"You weren't exactly quiet."

"Well, what's your opinion then?"

"She was right to call you out. What she did yesterday was no different than what you did last week or the week before that. You wouldn't tell Nat that she shouldn't do her job, would you?"

"Not if I wanted to live," I said. "But I know what Natasha is capable of."

"What happened at the museum today?" Natasha slid her phone over to me, showing me a picture of myself staring at my compass.

"Sarah said something Peggy had said to me – verbatim – and I froze, lost in 1943. I don't know for how long, but I scared her. She said I wouldn't talk, I didn't know she was there."

"Oh, Steve. Are you okay?" Natasha put her hand on mine.

"I promised to see a psychiatrist and I'm going home with her this weekend to meet some of her friends and family." I pulled out my phone and pulled up a picture of Bucky. "You've seen this one of Bucky." Natasha nodded and I scrolled to the next picture. "This is Sarah's best friend, Jace; he's Bucky's great-nephew."

"If I thought you needed therapy before, Steve, that just seals the deal." Clint shook his head in disbelief.

"The stranger things get, the more I agree with you. Two people from my past have come back to me, in a manner of speaking. I think I've had my share of surprises for this lifetime."

* * *

Sarah's POV

I followed Tony to his lab at what felt like the far end of the house. I could see the loose wrap under his Black Sabbath t-shirt. Having heard his kind of music, the shirt didn't surprise me in the least. His lab was huge with a couple of versions of the Iron Man suit in varying degrees of assembly. He moved papers around on his desk until he came up with a couple of the toothed fasteners for the Ace wrap.

"Take your shirt off so I can get it rolled up." I held my hand out for the fasteners and he dropped them in my open palm.

"I thought you'd never ask," he smirked, eyes twinkling.

"Tony!" I growled, ready to turn on my heel and walk back to the team.

"Kidding – just wanted to see what you'd say." He pulled his shirt off and I moved around him, rolling up the bandage as I went. I was a bit slower today. I could use my arm a little bit, but it would twinge if I moved too suddenly. "How's your shoulder?"

"It's getting there. I should be fine without my sling tomorrow. This bullet must have done more damage than I thought for it to take me this long to be able to use it."

"How fast do you heal, then?"

"Not as fast as Steve. Faster than you and Clint."

"Give me a time frame."

"Fine, if you stop slouching and hold still." I waited for him to do as I asked. "Bullet wounds usually take 1-2 days, broken bones, 3-5 days to a week depending on what I broke." I wound the fabric around him, pulling it tight enough he should feel better now. He was quiet while I finished up and pushed the fasteners in place.

"So you and Capsicle, huh?"

"What about it?" I handed him his shirt for him to shrug on and looked around his lab. A digital photo frame sat on one corner of his desk and I picked it up to watch it scroll through. Tony looked at it over my shoulder.

"Looks like Pepper found some new photos in the archives to add in. They must be pretty old photos; I'm really young in some of these. She's in the process of scanning in a lot of the old paper files so I can access them through Jarvis. Whenever she finds group pictures from various projects she loads them on these things and leaves them where I'll find them."

"Look at this one – you're still a teenager here."

"Nope, early twenties. I started growing a goatee then."

"Wait! That looks like my mom." I tapped the glass, pausing the feed. "Jarvis, can you enlarge this picture?" 

"Of course, Sarah." the AI replied as it appeared as a holo in front of us.

"Tony, how do you know my mom? That's her right there." I pointed and grabbed my phone out of my pocket. I had taken a picture of my mom's graduation picture when I made her drag it out for my graduation. I found it and threw it up next to the other picture – there was no denying it was her in her early to mid twenties. She hadn't changed much over the years.

"When was this picture taken, Jarvis?"

"September 1993 at Stark Laboratories in New York."

"Tony? Did my mom work for you before she had me?" I looked over to see him staring at me, lost in thought. I snapped my fingers in front of his face. "Earth to Tony!"

"What's your birth date?"

"May 5, 1994. Why?"

"Middle name?"

"Maria. Tony, are you okay?"

I watched as the color drained from his face and I shoved him down into the chair behind him when he wobbled. "J, what's wrong with Tony?"

"He appears to have experienced a severe shock. Shall I alert Captain Rogers or Dr. Banner?"

"No. I'll be fine," said Tony. "I just wasn't expecting... you surprised me." He turned the chair around to the computer behind him and started pulling up files rapidly. I watched him work, waiting for an answer to my earlier question. In a couple of minutes he found what he was looking for and opened the file. He sent it to the holo and I saw it was the reports from a human experiment. I skimmed through them quickly, not knowing why it was important.

"Tony, what am I looking at here? You did some genetic experimentation?"

"In 1990, we started a new experiment following a breakthrough with the super soldier serum. Dad had been trying to recreate it since Project Rebirth's initial success in 1943. He hadn't had any luck with it until the 90's. He passed away in '91, so it took me some time to touch base on all the projects he had in the works, some of them took me longer to find than others. One of these, Project Genesis, I wouldn't have found unless they called me in specifically, which they did. It was off the books, a secret joint project with Shield.

Project Genesis was made up of paid volunteers, married healthy women who were unable to conceive naturally through no fault of their own. The project had taken a specific cryo-frozen egg stock and genetically enhanced them. However, they had run out of the specific male haploid genetic contribution, so I did what needed to be done."

My eyes widened as I thought that through. "Whose sperm had they been using?"

"Howard Stark's."

"Wow. So I take it you donated yours? Unless you had uncles, which I know you don't, your DNA would have been closest genetically to what had been used originally."

"Correct. I gave them my sperm and allowed them continue that last cycle with the project. At the time, I was 22 and the sole heir to the Stark fortunes, so if it worked, great. If it didn't, I wasn't out anything; in the past three years, they had yet to have a single fetus make it past the second trimester. The embryos always quickened, but by 20 weeks, even though the fetus' developed more rapidly than normal ones and were significantly stronger, the women would go into early labor and baby would be stillborn.

Out of 50 test subjects over a three year period, only one woman was able to carry long enough for a child to be born. That child was born extremely prematurely at 28 weeks by emergency C-section following a car accident involving both her and her husband. The mother survived long enough to see the child, I was told. I didn't get there until after the baby was born. Against all odds, that baby girl fought to live. I had her transferred to a private NICU at my labs once she was strong enough. I shut down Genesis and buried the proof of success, falsifying the data to create a new identity." He looked up at me, meeting my eyes. "I could do that much to protect my daughter." I drew in a quick breath at that admission, starting to put the pieces together.

"A nurse that had worked on the experiment was a close friend to the birth mother and asked my permission to adopt the baby and raise it as her own. She and her husband had been unsuccessful in their attempt to have their own children and there was no other family to the birth mother. At the time, I had my hands full taking on running Stark Industries, which consumed all of my time and energy. I was also the target of multiple assassination attempts, which isn't the kind of atmosphere a sane person would want to raise a child in.

I had the couple investigated thoroughly and agreed that once the child was healthy enough to leave she would be theirs to raise to adulthood. They were relocated by Shield and I set them up with an account for the child's needs and had the paperwork taken care of. The project director was to track the child's development, which he did for several years. After the last move, I lost contact with them and stayed away for the child's safety." 

He watched my face as he spoke rapidly and I have no idea what he saw there. I followed what he was trying to say, though.

"So you're telling me that you, Tony Stark, are my biological father?" My voice rose in pitch as I got words out. This was the last thing I had expected to hear tonight.

"Yes." he winced. "Sorry, Sarah. You were not supposed to be informed of your adoption until you turned 21. We later learned that the accident that killed your birth mother was the first of many attempts on your life. Being raised away from me probably saved your life."

"So who is my real mom? Where did the egg that made me come from?"

"I don't know. Dad must have known, but I went through those files with a fine toothed comb - there is no mention of any donor by name." 

I raised my hands as I reached information overload. "We can talk more about this later, Tony. I'm still trying to wrap my mind around this one. It's going to take some time for me to process this." My stomach growled and I turned back to look at the pictures.

"I'll forward the files to you." Tony took my hand and set it on his arm to escort me back to the kitchen. I let him, realizing he needed that little bit of contact with me. "Let's go eat; I'm starving and Mario will throw a fit if we don't appreciate his cooking." We walked slowly back to the kitchen.

"I don't know what to think about this, Tony. I'm going home for my friends' graduation this weekend; I need to talk to my parents about this and find out more. Can I call you next week?"

"Any time. Natasha put my private number in your phone when she was adding in the team's numbers the other day." I pulled my hand from his arm to dig my phone out of my pocket. I scrolled until I pulled up his contact info. 

"Say cheese – I need a picture for your profile." He gave me an amused look and I snapped a photo of him and saved it. I tilted the screen towards him and showed him the number I had for him.

"Yup. That's me." 

"Good to know," I said as we walked into the kitchen. It smelled amazing, whatever it was.

"What's good to know?" asked Clint.

"That supper's ready. Hi Bruce. When did you get here?" I poured myself a shot of vodka and tossed it back, refilling my glass. Natasha gave me a strange look, but I ignored it and emptied my glass again.

"Just a little bit ago. I got stuck in traffic. What's for supper?"

"Eggplant Parmesan, lasagna, zuppa Tuscana and bread-sticks. Mario - no dessert?" asked Tony. I heard another man say something in rapid Italian but his voice was too quiet for me to catch what he said. Tony laughed and replied in fluent Italian, "Tiramisu's my favorite but I like cannolis too. Did you bring both?" Mario replied affirmatively and Tony turned back to the team. "Tiramisu and cannoli for dessert tonight. Grab a plate and dig in."

We all went and dished ourselves up. Steve tried to help me, but I shook my head and smiled. "I got it. Thanks, though." I loved authentic Italian and Tony's chef was excellent. The team joked with each other while we ate and I just listened, enjoying the easy banter. I savored my food, finishing a whole plate and going to get dessert. Natasha gave me a big piece of tiramisu since she was dishing herself up.

"So what did you and Tony talk about?"

"I can't say yet." I shook my head slightly and frowned. "I have to figure some things out this weekend first. If you can get him to tell you, go right ahead. I like watching you in action." I grinned at her and scooped up three cannoli before going to sit down. Clint tried to steal one off my plate so I whacked him with my fork, laughing. "Go get your own. They're like three steps away."

"But yours are closer." 

"Too bad, so sad. Next time I use the pointy end." I shook my fork at him menacingly; Clint laughed and went to get his own dessert.

"So what's the movie tonight? Did you make popcorn?" I asked Tony as I munched on a cannoli.

"How to Train Your Dragon. Pepper hasn't had time to prescreen anything else yet."

"Wait, what?"

"Pepper picks the movies for movie night. Apparently I have horrible taste in movies according to her."

"I think I'm okay not knowing the details, thanks." 

"It's better you don't." Steve shuddered. I rubbed his back soothingly. I looked around and everyone was about done eating, so I sat back and waited for them to finish. Steve took my plate with his and set them on the counter by the sink. He pulled me to my feet with a smile.

"Come on, I'll show you the way." I took his hand and grinned, following him to the screening room. It was tricked out like a true home theater with a huge semicircle leather couch that looked like it could seat 15 easily. There was a popcorn machine and a little snack bar.

"This is crazy. I'm dreaming, aren't I?" I rested my head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat.

"Nope. I don't know about you, but my imagination isn't that good." His hand stroked my loose hair and I smiled. He really seemed to like my hair down. If it was up, it seemed like he tried to free it. I could hear the others coming down the hallway, so we claimed seats near the middle and waited for everyone to get there. I tucked my feet under me and leaned on Steve's arm. It was kind of cold in this room, so I looked around for a blanket while Tony started the movie. I went and grabbed one and came back to sit down. 

Clint and Natasha were on the other side of Steve sitting together, shoulders touching. Bruce was on the right of me a couple seats down. Tony plopped down a couple feet from me and gave me and Steve a look. I raised one eyebrow and he shook his head. I shifted so my feet were in Tony's lap and he covered them with the blanket, just resting his hands on my ankles.

The movie was surprisingly good for an animated film and I stayed awake for the whole thing. I can't say I'd followed Dreamworks previously, but if they did this good of movies, then they were worth checking out.

We left not long after the movie was over and headed back to our building. I followed Steve into his apartment and went to grab my basket. He picked it up before I could, shaking his head at me. I grinned and let him carry it in for me. 

"If you're still coming home with me this weekend I'd like to leave right from work tomorrow."

"Can't wait. I'll pack tonight then."

"Your place or mine?" I asked him, not sure what he would say.

"Mine," he said, giving me a peck on the lips.


	14. Road Trip

Steve's POV

I could hear Sarah moving around my apartment while I was in the shower. I'd decided that I needed another cold shower before bed, not that it was helping in the least. All of the little touches we shared tonight had a cumulative effect on me; therefore, I was still semi hard when I got out and dried off. I didn't know how I was going to be able to sleep next to her, I was so turned on. 

I pulled on my boxers and a pair of shorts; I went to pull my shirt on and dropped it on the floor. I picked it up and it was soaking wet. The curtain must not have been all the way shut because there was a puddle on the floor. I used my towel to clean it up and tossed the wet things in the hamper. I shut off the bathroom light and walked into my bedroom. 

Sarah was already sleeping with the lights still on; I must have taken longer in the shower than I thought. I sorted through my emotions and decided it felt right that she was here with me, in my bed. I liked knowing she would be there when I woke up. I hadn't slept well at all last night without her, but I'd been more afraid of hurting her by moving in my sleep; I was so much larger and heavier than her.

I went and checked the door and shut off all the other lights. I found another soft shirt to sleep in and pulled it on before turning off the bedroom lights. I climbed in under the covers and rolled on my side, facing Sarah, who didn't wake up. The night was bright enough that I could see her peaceful face. I guess it had been kind of a long day for her, too, especially since her body was trying to heal. I looked at her until I dozed off. 

I woke up to Sarah tossing and turning in the midst of a nightmare. Her breathing was raspy and her eyes were open. I went to touch her shoulder and shook her.

"Sarah? Sarah wake up! You're having a nightmare." At my touch, she scrambled away from me until her back was against the headboard, whimpering, still asleep. I turned on the lamp beside me, hoping the light would help. "Sarah, wake up. Sarah!" She blinked, looking around wildly, gasping for breath. Her eyes focused on me, but she flinched when I stroked her face gently. "Are you okay? You were having a nightmare." I pulled her onto my lap carefully; she was trembling like a leaf, which couldn't feel great on her shoulder.

"Yes." I could barely hear her, so she cleared her throat and tried again. "Yes, thanks for waking me... I haven't... had one like that... in a long time. I'm sorry you had to see that." Her voice was still hoarse.

"It's okay. I get them too sometimes." I kissed her cheek and stroked her face as she leaned into me, the trembling starting to pass. "Do you want to talk about it?" I saw her swallow convulsively and consider for a second before shaking her head. 

"Not yet." She shivered hard and let out a small cry of pain.

"Come get under the covers and I'll help you get warmed up." She scooted off me and reached out to grab her water glass. She gulped it down and gingerly crawled under the covers. I laid back down next to her; Sarah crept over until she was laying entirely on top of me, her face pressed against my neck. I felt the last of her trembles subside as she started to relax into me, snuggling into the crook of my neck. She eventually drifted off again and I covered us with the sheets. 

 

* * *

Sarah's POV

 

Today was another long planning meeting. More intel had come in and we were going to have to modify our plan based off of that information. We got done with that at 1500 and I headed down to the hospital floor to have them take my stitches out. They were starting to itch and I couldn't leave them in any longer. The doctor who was on duty was nice. He had been there when they brought me in, so he had thought I was there because I had torn a stitch or something. He was amazed at how healed I was and said it was fine for the nurse to take them out. 

Steve came by the office at a little before 1700. I turned stuff off and tidied up. He waited in my office while I went to go change.

"Fury gave me the keys to a Shield car to take for the weekend. We're supposed to take it instead of your car, I guess."

"That's fine. I kind of figured that would be the case since you were coming with. It's probably armored and equipped for any situation we might run into."

He grinned and shrugged, making me laugh. I took his hand and he pulled me into his arms for a kiss. There wasn't anyone around, so I didn't mind. We broke apart at the sound of the door opening, only to see Maria standing there, a shocked look on her face.

"Wow. Wasn't expecting to see that!" Maria said, coming into my office and setting some papers on my desk. 

"Sorry!" I blushed and looked up at Steve, whose face was also quite red.

"Sorry, Maria. I thought you were gone for the day," said Steve, lips quirking.

 

Maria shook her head, "Don't worry about it. Barton told me he's won at least $100 on bets with Natasha since Monday." She smiled at Steve's disapproving expression, making me laugh. "It's okay, really. I'm happy for you, Steve. You deserve someone who will be good to you, and Sarah needs someone like you, too."

"Thank you, Maria. I'm actually quite relieved glad you're okay with this." He let go of me I'm going to go put our bags in the vehicle and pull it around, Sarah."

"Okay. I'll be down in a bit." I waited for him to leave before turning back to Maria.

"You're sure this is okay? I wasn't really planning on this happening, especially after Monday."

"No one ever plans to meet someone they connect with," she scoffed. "I think you'll be good for him. He needs someone like you to keep him from being too serious. You're willing to be patient with him and help get him used to this century, which he needs - he's been having a hard time adjusting."

"I've kinda noticed that," I said. 

 

"There's no rule against dating colleagues, Sarah. Plus, it isn't hard to see that you already care about him."

I nodded and smiled. "It's hard not to." I bit my lip before speaking again. "I thought it would be good for him to get away for a couple days, so Steve's coming home with me for the weekend to meet some of Bucky's family." 

"He doesn't know what a vacation is, Sarah. Yesterday was the first time he's actually taken a day off since he joined Shield."

I sighed. "Somehow that doesn't surprise me. See you Monday, Maria."

"Can't wait to hear about your weekend."

"Bye." I turned and walked out the door to the elevator. I took it down to the lobby and went outside to meet Steve. He was just pulling up as I got to the curb.

"Hey stranger. Going my way?"

"Hop in, beautiful." He waited for me to get in. "So where am I going?"

 

* * *

Sarah's POV

It was after nine by the time we finished eating, so I told my mom I was tired from the long week and ready for bed, which I was, so Steve and I went upstairs and changed for bed. Steve had said on the way here that he didn't we should sleep in the same room together because my dad would have kittens and I'd laughed at his phrasing. I pulled him into my room, kissing him lightly before laying my head on his chest. He stroked my hair lightly, careful of my shoulder.

"Steve, will you lay with me until I fall asleep?" 

"Only until then." He let go of me then, so I plugged my phone in and climbed into my comfy bed, reaching for his hand. I pulled him down onto my bed, settling myself in his arms.

"I'll see you in the morning, Sarah." He gave me a chaste kiss on my forehead and held me tightly.

"Good night, Steve."

I woke up in the middle of the night, reaching for Steve, only to remember he was in the guest room. I couldn't fall back asleep, so I got up to go get a drink. I could see light spilling out under the door to the guest room so I opened it and looked in to see if Steve was sleeping. He was sitting up in bed, reading a book. He looked up at me in surprise.

"Hey. I saw the light under your door. Can't sleep?" I whispered, shutting the door behind me.

"No, I seem have gotten used to a certain somebody in my arms at night," he smiled, shutting the book and setting it aside. I walked over to him and climbed on his lap, tucking my head in the crook of his neck. He wrapped his arms around me.

"And who would that be?" I kissed his cheek lightly.

"Hmm, I wonder."

"So since you're awake and I'm awake – want to have a difficult conversation before I have it with my parents?"

"That sounds... interesting – what kind of difficult conversation?"

I turned so I could see his face. "So yesterday, when we were at Tony's, I saw a picture in his lab from 1993. He and my mom were in it along with everyone working on something called Project Genesis."

"I'm not going to like this conversation, am I?" He stroked my face lightly, holding my eyes with his cobalt ones.

"Maybe, maybe not; probably not. I kinda thought I shouldn't blind side you, but I don't know all the details yet." I scooted off his lap and hugged my knees up to my chest, watching as he sighed and crossed his arms over his chest; briefly distracted by the rippling of his muscles. 

"I'm listening, Sarah; tell me what you do know."

"I'm kinda condensing this down to the basics, so bear with me as I talk this through. Project Genesis involved healthy, married women who couldn't get pregnant naturally. They were implanted with viable enhanced embryos. Of all of those involved, only one of them was able to carry a baby long enough for it to survive a really premature birth. 

There was an accident, and I understand that the woman and her husband were both in it, but he didn't make it. She only lived long enough to see the baby – me – be born. They had no other family, so a friend of theirs who worked at the project offered to adopt me and raise me as their own if I survived. I guess it turns out that she and her husband couldn't have kids either, so it worked out for the best. The biological dad and program director approved it." I felt tears prickling at the corners of my eyes, but I really didn't want to cry yet.

"Sarah? Are you okay?" He reached over and put his hand over mine.

"I don't know. Of all the people in the world, who do you think my biological dad is, Steve?"

"Tony."

"Bingo. Tony. He's also the reason I'm enhanced. As an embryo, I was given a version of the super-soldier serum that was used on you." A muscle in his jaw ticked. "Tony didn't start this project, Howard did. He died in 1991, though, so Tony wasn't aware of it until late 1993 when they needed more genetic material from the Stark line for the experiment."

"Howard was obsessed with recreating Project Rebirth, according to what I've heard." Steve said slowly, his brow furrowed. "It stands to reason he would have tried every possible way to make it work again." He took a deep breath. "So who was the egg donor? For an experiment to be controlled, the eggs would all have been from a single donor."

"Tony said he didn't know." I shrugged. "Howard didn't put the name in writing anywhere in the file. I checked the files, too, and came up empty. No mention anywhere." 

"So you didn't know you were adopted?"

"I wasn't supposed to be told until I turned 21. Tony made it sound like it was safer for me to not know."

"As the sole head of Stark Industries, he has a pretty big target painted on his back. I understand that it's a huge company and he's never married or had children - well, other than you."

"When I was born, he was only 21 himself. I'm sure thought he wouldn't have time for me since he was just taking over the reins fully. He wouldn't have been able to give a child a normal life. I would have had nannies and bodyguards and been locked in his tower."

"And I never would have met you." He took my hand and pulled me on his lap, holding me tight.

"Probably not. I almost certainly wouldn't have gotten to join Shield. I would have had to become a vigilante like Batman to get my crime-fighting kicks in." I looked up at him and grinned, trying to make light of this turn of events. He ran one finger down my cheek and I nipped at it.

"Well, I think Tony is richer than Bruce Wayne, so I guess he could afford to have a superhero for a daughter. It's not that far of a stretch, he is Iron Man, after all."

"I can't believe he's my other dad. My Dad will always be my dad. I don't even know what to call Tony."

"I can think of several things I'd like to call him for dropping this on you unexpectedly." Steve growled. I leaned up and kissed him, cutting off his train of thought. I loved the feel of his lips on mine; I couldn't get enough of him. I shifted so I was straddling him and crushed myself to his chest, pulling him tight to me. His hands moved to my hips and held me still, thumbs rubbing circles over my hip bones. Steve broke the kiss and rested his forehead on my good shoulder, breathing heavily. 

"I can't do this here, Sarah. It's your parent's house and I would prefer to not have to let your dad shoot me."

I sighed regretfully and then giggled as a random thought hit me. "Which dad?"

"Both," he kissed my forehead and lifted me up effortlessly to set me on my feet beside the bed.

"I weigh nothing to you, do I? I'm not a freaking feather." I grumbled, shaking my hair out of my face.

"You're my feather," He grinned. "Go to bed, Sarah."

"Fine. See you in the morning." I padded out of the room and went back to my own, closing the door behind me.

* *

The smell of bacon woke me up around 7 am. I laid there for a moment, thinking about my conversation with Steve last night. It was crazy, but I guess I always knew I wasn't an average 18 year old girl. I had wondered when I was younger why I was different from everyone else; now I finally knew. 

I got up and looked in the mirror to make sure I was decent and my wound wasn't visible. I pulled my hair up into a messy bun and pulled on my light morning sweater over my old t-shirt and shorts, ready to go downstairs for breakfast. Steve was already there, wearing a t-shirt and jeans, talking baseball with my dad. I filled a plate and coffee cup and sat down. 

I'd just crunched off a big bite of my bacon when I heard a knock on the glass of the patio door. Jace waved and I got up to unlock the door to let him in. He was wearing pajama pants and an old Captain America t-shirt, dark brown hair still messy from sleep. He looked like he had just rolled out of bed as he leaned his 6'3 frame down to pull me into a tight hug, folding his long arms all the way around me. He bussed my cheek, his whiskers scratching my face. "Morning, Sarah. I've missed you."

I flinched and hissed quietly when his hand touched my wound. He let me go and met my eyes, one brow raised in a question. I shook my head slightly to say 'not now' and he gave me a stern look. I rolled my eyes at him and turned to let him come in, rubbing his whiskered cheek. "You need to shave - and you just saw me last week, Jace. Did you eat already?" He nipped my bacon from my hand and crammed it in his mouth as he went to grab a plate to dish himself up. "Hey – that was mine!"

"You weren't eating it," he retorted.

My mom looked up from the paper to smile at him, "Morning Jace. You're up early." She went back to the paper, sipping her tea.

 

* * *

Steve's POV

I was aware of how much Sarah's friend physically resembled Bucky. He was a little taller and more muscular than Bucky had been, but otherwise identical. I thought I was ready to meet him, but I wasn't ready for how similar their mannerisms were, down to small motions with their hands while they talked and the same cocky devil-may-care attitude. It was even stranger, seeing him being so close to Peggy when the last time they'd been together they'd been barely civil to each other. I had to forcibly remind myself that Sarah wasn't Peggy.

"Morning Mami." Jace – not Bucky – said. "Everyone's staying at our house so I slept on the couch last night. The twins were up at dawn jumping on me to watch cartoons. I figured it's safer here." He set his plate on the table and nudged Sarah as he sat down so she scooted over so they were sharing the wooden chair. They couldn't have both fit on it, but somehow it worked. He'd already noticed me watching him, but in my mind, I was back in 1945, during a late night mission, just Bucky and I talking about what we were going to do when we got back home again. 

"Jace, this is my friend Steve Rogers," Sarah said, gesturing at me. "Steve, this is my best friend, Jace Barnes."

I held my hand out to Jace, who grasped it firmly, clearly in awe of me. Sarah took shameless advantage of his distraction to steal a piece of Jace's bacon, a grin on her face as she watched us.

"Nice to meet you, Jace. I've heard a lot about you." I let go of Jace's hand and reached for my coffee mug.

"Only the good stuff, I hope," he said, and I noticed that while his voice was deeper, the crooked grin and the amused twinkle in his cerulean eyes was the same as Bucky's. 

My chest hurt as I recalled the last time I'd been with Bucky in New York. We'd went to the Stark Expo the night before he'd shipped out.

"What did you tell her?" I'd asked Bucky as we walked into the show, upset that I'd have to share him on our last night together with another gal he wouldn't think twice about. 

"Only the good stuff," he'd said with a jaunty grin, his cerulean eyes twinkling with amusement. 

It was a good memory, the last time I'd seen him as skinny Steve, but it made me miss Bucky so much more. Even knowing beforehand that Jace would look like Bucky, I wasn't prepared for how hard it hit me that Bucky really was gone, and he wasn't coming back.

"Of course," Sarah replied, glancing at me with a curious expression. "I haven't got around to telling him about the time we borrowed your brothers' wagon and -"

"Have some more bacon, pooka! Steve doesn't need to hear that story." Jace said, holding out a piece of bacon to her as a bribe.

I forced myself to smile at their banter; Jace met my eyes briefly and turned his attention to his food just as Sarah attempted to take another piece of bacon from his plate and he endeavored to stab her with his fork. Sarah was faster, though and crunched the bacon happily, giving him a grin. I sipped my coffee, finishing it quickly. I hadn't realized I'd been lost in thought until I felt a small hand on my arm squeezing it firmly as she leaned over to refill my cup. I took a deep breath and smiled at her, back in the present time.

"Thank you." I said, and I hoped she knew it wasn't just for the coffee. She topped off her dad's cup and put the pot back on the warmer before going back to her chair, nudging Jace with her hip to let her back on the chair. I simply watched them with an amused smile.

"So Jace, are all your aunts, uncles and grandparents coming to the ceremony?" Sarah asked him.

He swallowed before answering, "As if I could talk any of them out of it! They seem to think that if they don't witness this it never happened. I'm the valedictorian for Pete's sake- not the class clown! Even my great-aunt Rebecca from Brooklyn is here. Chloe's picking me up at 1:30 so we get there on time and I can avoid getting sandwiched in the back seat with the twins."

I couldn't believe that Becky was still alive – she had to be in her late 80's then. I listened to Sarah and Jace chattering with half an ear, not thinking I would need to contribute to the conversation anytime soon.

"They're not that bad."

"To you! They like you; they kinda somewhat behave around you! Around me, they're like yapping puppies chasing their tails and fighting over a bone." I could hear the fondness in his tone when he talked about his little brothers. Bucky'd had the same tone whenever he'd complained about his younger siblings, too. Sarah only laughed at his complaint. He scooped up the last bite of eggs and polished off his orange juice. 

"You coming over to see everyone this morning?" he asked, and luckily Sarah answered, because I didn't know what to say.

"A little bit later, maybe right before dinner. Things should be less chaotic by then."

Jace snorted. "Keep telling yourself that, pooka." He stood up and put his dishes in the sink before going to let himself out the patio door. "Thanks for breakfast Mami, see you later." He kissed Mrs Evans' cheek and gave her a one armed hug.

"You're welcome, Jace," she said with a pleased smile, ruffling his unruly hair. "See you later."

"Jace very conveniently lives just next door on the other side of the hedge." Sarah told me, pointing the right direction. "I'm going to go get in shower. Mom, will you send Chloe up if she gets here before I come back down?"

"Of course. I'm surprised Jace beat her here."

"I'm not. She's probably still doing her hair." Sarah put her dishes in the sink and headed upstairs as Mr Evans and I continued our discussion of baseball like nothing had happened.

Another one of Sarah's friends showed up shortly after that, a petite blond who seemed to be a frequent visitor here as well. She introduced herself as Chloe Turner and told me she lived across the street. She was wearing a light summer halter dress and her blond ringlets were piled on her head, and I gathered that she was graduating today as well. Chloe got herself a cup of coffee and took the open chair sitting at the table, talking to Sarah's parents briefly before starting to ask me questions. 

By the time Sarah came back downstairs, her questions had become more pointed, hinting that she was available. My posture became more rigid, and I was feeling a little threatened by her. I didn't want to ask her questions because then she would think I was interested in her when that couldn't be farther from the truth. 

Sarah came to stand next to me, putting her arm around my shoulder and leaning into me. She murmured a quiet apology so only I could hear her.

"Sorry Steve, I thought I'd beat her here. She'll back off if I claim you."

"Please do," I begged, putting my arm around her waist. Chloe's hazel eyes widened slightly, getting the message that I wasn't interested in her, just Sarah. I relaxed slightly as Chloe shifted her attention to Sarah.

"Hey Sarah. Your mom said you would be down in a minute," Chloe grinned, completely unapologetic.

"Morning Chloe. She tell you Jace beat you here?" Sarah said, running her hand through my hair for a moment before she eased out of my hold and sat in her mom's empty chair. Mrs Evans was washing dishes already. I'd offered to help earlier only to be turned down. I don't think she was comfortable having her guests work, but my mom had been the same way.

"That little punk – I'm going to kill him!" Chloe said, banging her hand on the table. "He said he wasn't going to come over until later."

"It was at least after 7 and we're going over there later." Sarah said, grinning at her friend. "Did you really believe him when he told you that?"

She smirked, "Nope. He was rubbing his ear."

"So Steve, I see you met my other best friend." 

"Yes...it's been an interesting morning so far." I smiled wryly, sipping my coffee. 

Chloe snorted and got up to refill her coffee cup with the little bit left in the pot. "Always is around Sarah." she said. "Are you coming over later? We're having my party at my grandparents this afternoon. Their house is bigger and Gramps is, well, Gramps. I told him you'd be in town," she said with a shrug. Her grandpa was even more stubborn than me, which is probably why we got along so well.

"Hah – you knew there wasn't going to be any choice involved a long time ago. He always gets his way!" Sarah grinned. "Of course we'll be by afterwards."

"Great! I told him I knew you'd come see him." Chloe returned her grin. "So are you going to show Steve around town?"

"I don't know; we have a little time this morning, I guess. I haven't asked him if there was anything he wanted to see while we were here. Steve?" Sarah asked, turning to me as I stood up.

"Sure. I've never been to Princeton before. Are you going to tell me the stories involved?"

"If she won't I will." Chloe volunteered.

"Sounds like fun," I said with a smile. "Shall we?" I pushed my chair in and gave my empty cup to Mrs Evans. Chloe finished her coffee and put the cup by the sink.

"Bye Mom, Dad. If we don't see you before you leave, Steve and I will meet you at the school. We're sitting by Jace's family in Section C."

"Sure, see you later, honey."

"See you later, Mami, Papi!" called Chloe.

We all got in the Shield car; I insisted on driving after talking to Chloe and Sarah only shook her head when I gave her a questioning look and held out the keys. They directed me past Sarah's college and Jace and Chloe's high school. 

Chloe and Sarah reminisced about the random silly things they had done growing up as I followed their directions. I enjoyed seeing this side of Sarah, the typical American teenager growing up in a smaller town. It wasn't anything like her normal behavior around me so far. It was a great way for me to learn a lot about Sarah because Chloe – true to her word – told every story she thought of, whether Sarah wanted her to or not. My muscles ached from laughing so hard by they time we headed back to Sarah's.


	15. Steve? Is it really you?

Steve's POV

If I hadn't been prepared for Jace, I wasn't prepared to see his family, either. It would be like when I'd first seen Peggy in this time – in my mind, they were forever young, frozen at whatever age they'd been the last time I'd seen them, but they weren't. Time had moved on and left me behind. I was a little nervous about how I would be received at the Barnes household.

"We don't have to go, if you don't want to, Steve." Sarah said softly, looking up at me. She took my hand and twined her fingers with mine. I was grateful that she didn't know how hard this was for me; at the same time, I was glad she was here with me. She was my anchor to this time. 

"I need to do this, Sarah. I need to see Rebecca and Bucky's brothers. Bucky's family was all I had after my Mom died and they were there for me when I needed them."

"Then it's good that they'll have you back again, even if it took almost 70 years for you to come back. I'm sure it was hard for them to lose you both one after another."

I gave her a sad smile. She had a way of looking for the best in a situation. Rebecca would be at least 80 now. It was possible she might not remember me. Or worse, she would hate me for not being able to save her brother.

The front door flew open and two boys came running out before we even got up to the steps. These must be Jace's little brothers. They didn't slow down as they launched themselves at Sarah, who had anticipated the attack, pulling her hand from mine and flipping over them suddenly, landing lightly on her feet. They spun around to face her and sandwiched her in a hug. 

"No fair, Sarah! I hadn't even touched you yet!" said one of them.

She laughed. "Then I win this time. James, Grant. I have someone I'd like you to meet." she turned them to face me and their eyes were wide. Their blue-grey eyes were the same as Jace's, a shade lighter than Bucky's had been. My heart clenched painfully as suddenly as I thought I was seeing Bucky as he had been when we had first met as kids. Their jaws dropped as they recognized me. 

"Steve, this one is James." She pointed to the one who closest to me. "This one is Grant. They're 10 going on 3. Boys, this is Steve Rogers. He's a friend of mine from work."

"You work with Captain America?" said Grant, looking me over.

"Sure do. Iron Man too."

"No way! That is so cool!" exclaimed James. "I can't believe Jace didn't tell us you knew Captain America!"

"Did you know our great-uncle James Buchanan Barnes? Grandpa said you did." 

"I sure did. He was my best friend since we were your age. We lived in the same apartment building in Brooklyn before the war." Sarah pulled us toward the house as they peppered me with questions. They were so excited they were bouncing and skipping around me.

"Did you really fight together? He was a Howling Commander?"

"I heard you personally punched Hitler in the jaw!"

I laughed, thinking back to my USO days. "Yes to all three, but it wasn't the real Hitler and I punched him over 200 times."

They chattered at each other so quickly I couldn't understand them.

"Where are your grandparents at, boys?" Sarah asked, speaking over their chatter.

"They're all in the back yard. They said it was too nice to stay inside."

Sarah took me through the house to the back yard. There was quite a few people out there and I saw a group of older people sitting at a table under a shady tree. She pulled me towards them, smiling and waving at various people as we passed them. Jace came up on Sarah's other side and said something to her in a low voice. We walked over to the table and Jace got everyone's attention.

"Everyone, this is Steve Rogers. I understand you all knew him a long time ago. Steve, this is my great aunt Rebecca, my grandpa John, my grandma Dorothy, my great-uncle Ben." He gestured to each person in turn. Rebecca, looked at me in recognition and I went over to her first.

"Hello, Becky. Do you remember me?" I asked, my heart in my throat. She indicated she wanted to stand and I helped her to her feet carefully. She pulled me into a tight hug, she only came up to my chest now. I put my arms around her carefully.

"Steve! Oh my goodness, Steven Grant Rogers where have you been? I had heard you were alive, but I didn't believe it. It really is you!" She beamed up at me, amazed.

"Yeah, Becky, it's me. I didn't know you were still alive or how to find you." I turned to look at Sarah, who smiled, leaning into Jace, who had his arm around her shoulder and was taking pictures with his phone. "If it hadn't been for Sarah, I never would have found you again."

"She's a remarkable girl, our Sarah," said Becky, letting me go. Bucky's brothers were standing next to me, looking at me in amazement. 

"Steve. It's so good to see you!" John held me by my shoulders, looking at me. I pulled him into a hug.

"You too, Johnny Boy, you too." He let me go and I turned to Ben.

"Benji, you're a lot bigger than I remember." He laughed and hugged me tight.

"I was going to say the same about you, Stevie. What did they feed you in the Army?" he said, squeezing my biceps.

"Lots of potatoes. Sit down everyone, I'm not going anywhere for a while. You're going to have to fill me in on what I missed over the last 70 years."

 

* * *

Sarah's POV

It was great to see how well everyone took Steve's arrival. I looked up at Jace, who was grinning and taking pictures on his phone. He had one arm around my shoulder and I wrapped my arms around his waist and leaned into him, relaxed.

"Thanks for prepping them for me. Steve was worried they would be angry with him."

"Why? It's not like he could have done anything more to try and save Uncle Bucky. He may be Captain America, but he's still only human."

"He thinks he should have saved Bucky. You look amazingly like him, you know."

He laughed. "I do know. I've heard that for years from my whole family. So now tell me. What's wrong with your shoulder?"

"I got shot."

"Again? You didn't tell Mami, did you? That's why you wouldn't say anything earlier, wasn't it?"

"Other shoulder this time, and no I didn't tell my mom. Did you tell your mom when I broke your ribs?"

"Not quite the same, but no, I didn't and you know it."

"Still want to be a Shield Agent, Barnes?"

"Of course. It's definitely a better choice than the Army."

"For some reason, Barnes men that join the Army don't seem to come back, and I don't mean just Bucky. I don't blame your parents for not letting you join. I think you'll do well as an Agent."

"So how did you get shot this time or can't you tell me?" 

"I can tell you the basics. We were running this undercover op and I was on my way out when a sniper took a crack at me. One of the team took him out, but I went down. Steve got me to the bird and helped patch me up."

"Jesus, Sarah! You could've been killed! They hit you in the right spot and even you won't heal from it, you know." 

"I know. I was just in the right place at the wrong time."

"So are you dating him or what? I've never seen you look at a guy like that, ever."

"Not yet, he thinks he needs to ask my dad's permission first."

Jace chuckled and looked down at me with a crooked grin. "Wow. Guess I don't have to worry about him getting fresh with you, then."

"None of your beeswax, Barnes. I don't ask you about your extracurricular activities."

"Sarah Maria Evans, have you-"

I slapped his chest to shut him up. "Not answering whatever you were going to ask. Did I tell you?" I asked, changing the subject.

"Tell me what?" 

"So I guess I look like someone Steve knew back during the war, someone who knew Bucky too."

"Who?"

"Peggy Carter."

"The Peggy Carter who founded Shield?"

"Yup. The very same. Look at this picture and tell me what you think." I tapped my phone and pulled up the picture, handing Jace my phone. 

He whistled. "Damn! You're a dead ringer for her. How'd Steve take meeting you?" He handed my phone back.

"How does anyone take meeting me? It threw him for a loop for a little bit but he's working on it. Did you know there's a Smithsonian exhibit on Captain America and the Howling Commandos? They had a nice bit about Bucky, a couple videos and everything. You should really go see it."

"Really? I know what I'm doing next week, then. Think Chloe would want to go with?"

"Probably. If you're really lucky you won't have to take your brothers with." He groaned and I glanced at the time. "You better go get ready. It's almost time for you to get going if you're riding with Chloe."

"Okay. See you later, Sarah." He headed into the house to get changed and I went to go stand next to Steve. I put my hand on his shoulder and he put his arm around my waist, pulling me onto his lap. My cheeks flushed and I waved at everyone as they chuckled.

"Hello everyone. I was just going to say that we have to go get changed if we're going to make the graduation on time. We'll be back later so you all can finish catching up." I hopped out of Steve's lap and pulled him up, heading back to my house. 

"Did you have a good day so far?" I asked him as he took my hand in his.

"I did. Thank you for bringing me here."

"You're welcome. I'm only sorry you didn't know about them sooner." 

My parents had left already, so we went upstairs to get changed. I put on a light summer dress and tamed my hair again. I put on a little bit of makeup and a squirt of body spray and pulled my shoes out of my bag. I went downstairs to find Steve waiting for me, looking at the pictures my parents had of me everywhere. I came up next to him and put my arms around him. He had found a particularly horrible picture of me wearing a late 90's neon pink wind suit. I'd thought it was the coolest thing ever at the time – now, not so much. He set the picture down and wrapped his arms around me. His breath tickled my ear when he finally spoke.

"You know, being adopted doesn't change anything. They're still your parents."

"In my heart, I know that. In my mind, I just gained another dad. I still need to talk to them, though. I want to know more."

"There's always going to be more to know."

"That's not a bad thing. Ready to go?"

"Sure. I haven't been to a graduation since my own." I slipped on my cute flats. I hated heels with a passion – they were hard to fight in. We walked out to the car and got buckled in.

"And when was that?"

"1936."

"They probably haven't changed much. I've had three of them already and they were all pretty much the same." Steve backed the car out and headed to the high school.

"You really are an overachiever, aren't you?"

"What can I say? I guess I take after my old man." I laughed. "That is still so weird to me!"

"So do I need to ask Tony if I can date you, too?"

"Nope. Not unless you're going to record it so I can hear his response. Steve, did you seriously ask my dad if you could date me?" I looked at him incredulously. 

"Of course."

"What did he say?"

"Quite a bit, actually. But yes, he gave me his permission to date you. I'm going to do this the right way, Sarah."

"So we're going to go on a real date? Do I have to wear a dress?"

"You look very nice in dresses." He smiled, giving me an admiring look. 

"I've never been on a date unless you count the undercover stuff I did at Ops."

"I'm not counting missions since you were pretending to be someone else. I haven't been on a date since 1943."

"Did you go on a lot of dates back then?"

"Only whenever Bucky wanted to see a girl that wouldn't go out without a friend along, so I guess so. They were what you would call an 'epic fail'. They usually ended with both girls clinging to Bucky's arm by the end of the night. The rest of the time the girl would take one look at me and tell her friend to go without her."

"Oh, Steve. Why?"

"You've seen what I looked like before Project Rebirth. I was 90 pounds and 5'4. I couldn't talk to a pretty girl to save my life and once they met Bucky, they didn't want anything to do with me. Women don't exactly line up to dance with someone they might step on."

"But you must have danced." I said, my heart hurting for little Steve.

He shook his head. "I don't know how – never learned. Asking a woman to dance always seemed so terrifying and then the war happened and it didn't seem to matter that much. I figured I'd wait."

"For what?"

"The right partner."

"I feel like we've had this conversation before, maybe in another life." I reached over and squeezed his hand. He quirked his lips at my dramatics, but he wasn't having a meltdown, so I took that as a positive. 

He pulled into the parking lot at the school. We were still pretty early, but if we were going to get good seats we had to be. We walked slowly towards the gym, hand in hand. That was the only place large enough to hold that many people, according to Jace and Chloe. "Something similar happened when you talked to Jace today, didn't it? There was a strange expression on your face and you got quiet."

"Yes," said Steve, exhaling loudly. "He said something I'd said to Bucky in 1943, right before he shipped out. I knew he looked like Bucky from the pictures you showed me... I just wasn't ready for him to sound like Bucky or act like Bucky, though. He and Peggy got along well enough, but they were never that close, not like she was with some of the other Commandos – definitely not like you and Jace are. Seeing you two together was how I had wished it had been. I can see he means a lot to you."

"He does." I smiled, "Probably as much as your Bucky meant to you. There's almost nothing I wouldn't do for him. He's going to be joining Shield, you know. He leaves for Ops in two weeks."

"That's good. He'll be a good agent from what I've seen of him so far." 

We reached the gym lobby and I grabbed a program and took a moment to look around and find section C. I spotted Jace's parents and pointed them out to Steve. We made our way over to them and I saw my folks were sitting there already, too. I introduced Steve to Jace's parents and we took our seats between them and my parents. They hadn't met him earlier when we were at their house, so they chatted while I made sure I had a clear shot so I would be able to get good pictures of Jace and Chloe crossing the stage. My dad and Mr Barnes had a lot of specific questions for Steve about WWII and Bucky. The twins and I listened while I watched the gym slowly fill up. We were actually seated pretty close to the stage, so I guessed it was by alphabetical order, since Chloe's parents were on the other side of the gym and a little farther from the stage. I glanced through the program, but there really weren't any other names that I recognized other than a couple of Jace's sports buddies that I had heard Jace talk about over the years.

Finally, the music started and the ceremony got under way. Jace's speech was surprisingly good; a little funny, a little optimistic, with a good portion of my own speech at my Shield graduation being re-purposed. I got excellent pictures of both of them, which was good since I was pretty sure Mrs Barnes was crying happy tears well before Jace crossed the stage. Mr Barnes beamed with pride and the twins whistled and hooted loudly as their big brother's name was called. 

It took a while for the gym to empty and James and Grant took advantage of this uninterrupted time with Steve to continue pelting him with questions and tried to convince me that they should ride back home with us. I managed to wiggle out of committing to that, much to Steve's relief. We finally got out of the gym and headed to the car, skipping the receiving line.

"So was it like you remembered?" I asked Steve.

"It's a little more sentimental than I remember. The speeches – it's more of a stepping off point. Not everyone graduated from high school in my time. Most stopped going to school after 8th grade. I was a sickly scrawny thing, so my mom made me stay in school. I even went to a year of art school. I was good at drawing, thought maybe I could get a job as a sketch artist."

"Do you still draw or paint?"

"I haven't since I was thawed, but I think I will soon. I'd like to draw you, if you wouldn't mind."

"Sure. I'd like that. It would be neat to see some of your drawings sometime. I can't draw to save my life."

"I haven't done it in so long I'm not sure how it will turn out." he gave me a self depreciating grin and we got into the car.

We stopped over at Chloe's grandparent's house first so I could drop off her present and say hi to her family. Gramps was pleased to meet Steve. He had seen Steve's USO show as a kid and it had made an impression on him. We didn't stay long, more of Chloe's relatives were arriving and it was time to get back over to Jace's. I had said we would be back so Steve could catch up with everyone.


	16. Photographs

Sarah's POV

We finally left Jace's after supper. Things were starting to wind down and everyone had started to go home. Also, I wanted time to talk to my parents. It was already almost 8 and they generally went to bed between 9 and 10 pm.

"Mom, Dad. We're back!" I hollered as we came in the front door. I kicked off my shoes and looked around. The lights were on, so I knew they were home already. I found them in the living room; dad was watching TV and mom sitting next to him, leafing through a photo album. They looked up when we came in and dad switched off the TV. 

"I got a phone call today from someone I hadn't talked to in a very long time," my mom said slowly. "It's been a little over six years, in fact."

"Who was it, Mom?"

"Mr. Tony Stark."

I nodded. "I found an old picture when I was at his house on Thursday night. He's part of the team I work with at the Triskelion."

"He said you'd learned about Project Genesis and probably had some questions for us. Is that right?"

I looked at Steve, who had turned to leave the room again. I caught his arm and met his eyes. "Stay?"

"Are you sure?" he asked and I nodded. He took my hand and led me to the love seat across from the couch, sitting down next to me. I tucked my feet under me and twined my fingers with his.

"Yes, I told Tony that I wanted to talk to you first before I did anything else. Were you really not going to tell me until I turned 21?"

"We couldn't," my dad said, nodding. "It was the only detail Mr. Stark insisted on as part of the agreement when we adopted you. He never signed away his rights to you, Sarah; he technically only loaned you to us until you were an adult. It's going to sound cliché, but it really was for your own safety."

"How did you become a part of the project, Mom? Was Dad part of it, too?"

"Your father was a junior professor at NYU when we first met and got married. I had finished nursing school top in my class and was recruited by Shield to be a part of their medical teams. We were spread out in small groups over the tri-state area to treat Agents that were injured in the line of duty. The primary doctor I worked under, John Hopkins, was well known to Howard Stark, so when Howard asked him to join this project, Doctor Hopkins insisted that I be allowed to join as well. He said I had a calming way with patients, which would be beneficial, considering the emotional nature of this project." My mom took a deep breath before continuing the story. 

"Genesis was, without a doubt, one of the most challenging things I have ever done. I sat in on a panel that screened the applicants we got for the project. The parameters were quite specific: they had to be healthy, married, no prior children, unable to conceive but healthy. They ranged in age from 22-28. Once they were accepted for the project, we had to begin tracking their fertility cycles to know when would be the optimal time for implantation.

I didn't have anything to do with the science part of the experiment - it was need to know only. I would then prep the subjects for implantation and do everything possible to make them comfortable. Then came the waiting. We had 3 subjects a month and one control, so I saw them weekly along with the OBGYN on the project. At first, I was optimistic because over a third of the subjects became pregnant. Then the difficulties would start... 

By the end of the first trimester, half of the subjects would miscarry. The other half made it through varying stages of the second trimester; however, the fetus' developed faster than the average fetus. They were very strong and sometimes did a lot of damage to the host mother. Broken bones, damaged organs, hemorrhaging, detached placenta, anything that could possibly go wrong – we dealt with it all, doing our best to keep the mothers alive when we couldn't save the babies. 

Eventually, despite our efforts and putting the mothers on bed rest early, the baby would often be born extremely prematurely, always stillborn. I would console them as best I could. The ones who wanted to try again were later implanted with normal embryos and most of them had successful pregnancies and went on to have natural children.

In the summer of 1993, the scientists informed us that the project would be put on hold unless they acquired more genetic material from the male line they had been working with. Mr. Stark visited the lab in person and talked to a lot of us, trying to determine whether it was feasible to continue or not, I suppose. In reality, he had to donate enough sperm so that we could finish the experiment by the end of '93, which was our end date based on the eggs we had available.

Finally, there was one subject who, against all odds, managed to carry into the third trimester. The baby was pretty well behaved and hadn't caused the host much damage other than some bruising and cracked ribs. We were hopeful that this baby would make it long enough to be born normally. That all changed when we received word that the host and her husband had been involved in a particularly bad car accident. 

Doctor Hopkins, the OBGYN and I rushed to the hospital they were taken to and took over the operating room. We performed the emergency C-section right away because she insisted we save you. I think she knew she wasn't going to make it. She had lost too much blood and was in pretty bad shape. I showed you to her and she smiled, passing away moments later. When we later took stock of her condition, there was no possible explanation for how she had managed to hold on long enough for you to be born; but the fact that she kept her heart was beating that long was a miracle."

My mom handed me an old photograph that I had never seen. A very young Tony Stark in hospital scrubs was holding a tiny crying baby. His expression was amazement tinged with terror. "Mr. Stark got there and was scrubbed in not long after the doctor pulled you free. I brought a camera with me to the hospital, you see. It only seemed fitting that he be the first one to hold you, after all. He placed you in a warmer so we could check you over. At 28 weeks, you were still under developed and fighting to live. We took you back to the lab by Stark's private ambulance to keep you in the NICU we had there. I stayed with you until you were finally strong enough to leave the NICU."

My mom handed my another picture I had never seen. I had heard that I was tiny when I was born, but I hadn't ever known how early I had been born. This one showed my mom in her nurse's outfit next to an incubator. My eyes were covered with gauze and I was pretty tiny. 

"By then," my mom continued, "I had become attached to you, so after talking it over with your father, I asked Mr. Stark if we could adopt you. We had been married for 5 years by then and I still had not conceived. After investigating us thoroughly, Mr. Stark agreed to the adoption. It was provisional, meaning that at age 21, our rights to you dissolved and you were to be returned to him. He set up accounts for your care and worked with Shield so that I would be able to stay home with you full time until you started school."

"Didn't he want me?" I asked.

"Of course he did, Sarah!" My mom said fervently. "He didn't think he would be able to keep you safe, though. He had just taken on running Stark Industries a couple of months earlier and was the target of multiple assassination attempts. There was also the fact that we didn't know how you were going to develop. The embryos were all treated with a serum before implantation that was supposed to make them faster and stronger than regular humans. As a Stark, it was expected that you would be a genius. You were supposed to be able to recover from injuries at a phenomenal rate.

Mr. Stark didn't want you scrutinized by the press in case someone ever realized you were enhanced. Given how quickly you grew as a child, there was no way it wouldn't have been noticed. We still don't know your full potential. It is entirely possible that you will age at a very slow rate now that you have reached your full growth. 

"In addition to your value as Mr. Stark's sole heir," my dad said, looking at Steve, "there are people who would do anything they could to get their hands on you for your blood alone. I'm sure Steve, who was given a similar serum, is aware of how dangerous that could be in the wrong hands."

Steve nodded, "That is very true. Johan Schmidt, the Red Skull, was one of them. He used an early version of Dr. Erskine's formula on himself with disastrous results."

"We moved a lot when you were younger to avoid interested individuals. You probably don't remember much until we moved to South Dakota." I shook my head, confused. I had always thought that I had been born there, but it would seem that wasn't the case. "You fit in well there, having learned to blend in by then, and it seemed as if we had shaken the men that had been on your trail, so we settled there for several years until you needed further education. We knew you were still too young to officially join Shield, so we picked Princeton; it was close enough that you could commute and Agent Gregg could supervise your training. I lost touch with Mr. Stark when we moved here, beyond informing him of your current location. We still had some time left while you were ours, so we tried to give you an ordinary American childhood, at least as much as we could with your abilities. When you left to go to DC to work at the Triskelion, we knew it would only be a matter of time before you would run into Mr. Stark." 

"Met him my first real day there. So who is my biological mother?"

"We don't know. A name was never used in any of the paperwork I saw. I never heard any of the staff mention anyone, either." 

"So do I still get to call you Mom and Dad?"

"Of course, Sarah. You will always be our daughter, too." My mom had tears in her eyes and my dad was holding her hand.

"Are you okay with me getting to know Tony? I understand why things are this way, but I feel like I should give him a chance to be a part of my life, too. Not just in the background where he's apparently always been."

My parents both nodded, finding it hard to speak at the moment.

"I think he'd like that, Sarah," said Steve. "He's missed out on so much already. You didn't see him on the jet back home. He was pretty cut up about it all."

"So is that really why you and Dad have had Shield clearances? Not because of my age when I joined?"

"We have both been with Shield the whole time," said Dad. "It was necessary to keep you safe. There has always been a Shield agent stationed within a block of our house and at your schools."

"That explains so much, now that I think of it. Why else would my babysitters always be so old? Everyone else got teenagers as their babysitters and I always had at least a college student. So Sam? Was he Shield?"

"No. He was vetted by Shield, but he's just a family friend."

"So who else knows who I really am?"

"Other than us, Mr. Stark, and Kevin, just Director Fury. He would have been told when he became the director. I'm not aware of anyone else."

I looked at Steve, raising an eyebrow. "Steve, do think Maria knows?"

"Hard saying. She is Fury's right hand, so it's possible. You'd have to ask him when we get back." He brushed his thumb over my knuckles lightly.

"Is this something that we are keeping under wraps until I turn 21?" My parents nodded. 

"We weren't planning on making any sort of announcement," my mom said, looking up at Dad. "Mr. Stark was going to talk to his lawyers to make sure you're protected from any fallout over this, but he still thinks it would be best to wait until you are of age to appoint you as his successor."

I shook my head. "I don't want to run his company, Mom. I didn't know I was his daughter until the other day. I need to find him a wife ASAP. I want to be an Agent, not a CEO. Besides, Pepper pretty much runs the company anyway."

"You find out you have a second dad two days ago and you're already trying for another mother?" asked Steve, confused by my logic.

"That sounds so much worse when you say it that way, but sure. I could use some siblings, well half siblings I guess they would be."

"Sarah!" my mom said, scolding me.

"What Mom? I'm 18, it's not like I'm going to get any otherwise - and Jace and Chloe don't count."

"They might as well for as often as they're here." Mom said with a smile. "You've never heard you and Jace get into it."

I grinned at her as a thought struck me. "Can you adopt him too and make it official? I don't think his little brothers would mind. They've already got plans for his room for when he leaves for Ops."

Mom and Dad just laughed at the thought of another teenager in the house. I got up off the couch, pulling Steve up too.

"I'm going to get ready for bed." I leaned down to hug my parents. "Night, Mom, Dad."

"Night, honey."

"See you in the morning, sweetie."

* * *

Steve's POV

The whole conversation with Sarah's parents went surprisingly well. I thought that Sarah still had more questions than answers, but nothing was going to change overnight. I followed her upstairs, going into the guest room to grab my sleepwear. Sarah was in her room and I could hear her talking on the phone to either Chloe or Jace, so I got into the shower, washing quickly so I'd be done by the time Sarah got off the phone. I could still hear her talking when I got out and got dressed, so I knocked on her door to tell her I was done with the shower. She opened her door and waved me in, listening to whomever was on the other end.

"No, don't do that. I'll come get you. We can be there in 10 minutes. Just stay put, okay?"

The other person must have agreed, because she continued. "Okay, be there in a few." She ended the call and looked up at me. "Want to go on a rescue mission? My friends are at the senior party. Jace says Chloe's drunk already and her stupid loser ex is making moves on her. She wants me to come get her."

"Sounds easy compared to what we normally have to do. Do you know where it's at?"

"Yup, I've got her iPhone located on my phone and Jace is staying with her. I'm going to change quick and then we can go. I'm not walking in the woods in a dress." She walked over to her closet and pulled out a t-shirt and jeans. 

"I'll get the keys and my wallet." I said, closing the door behind me. I went back to my room and changed into a pair of jeans, tucking my wallet into my back pocket. I went downstairs to get my shoes on and heard Sarah coming down the steps. 

She stopped to talk to her parents for a moment and then came to the entry and slipped her shoes on, opening the front door. "Mom said Chloe can stay here tonight."

"That's probably best. Doesn't look like anyone's up at her place." We climbed into the Shield car and I backed out of the driveway, following Sarah's directions.

"That way," she pointed. "No, her folks go to bed pretty early most of the time. She usually stays with me whenever we were planning on being up past 10, like when we went to the late movies."

"So you're not a partier?"

"I don't mind being social but it takes a lot for me to get drunk. Now that I know about the serum, that makes sense why it takes so much, but I know my limits."

"Your serum must be different than mine," I said slowly. "I can't get drunk at all. Anesthetics don't work on me, either, but they do on you?"

 

"Yes, it takes a lot, though, more than most doctors are comfortable with using. Turn at the stop sign, Steve." I rolled to a stop before turning, glancing over at Sarah. "Is there a drug-reversal kit in here?"

"Center console. You think someone gave here something or are you anticipating trouble?"

"Chloe drinks like a fish. I know she can handle her liquor quite well. There is no reason she should be this drunk already short of doing a lot of shots. This kind of party is generally a kegger. It's meant to be a cheap, social, celebrating kind of party."

"I take it you have been to one before?"

"Last year when some of Jace's buddies graduated. I was his DD, and I didn't really know anyone there so I mostly just watched. It was quite entertaining, other than getting hit on by drunk guys. I couldn't tell you how many times I've had to pretend Jace was my boyfriend to get some douche to leave me alone without knocking him out. So if they bug me tonight, I am claiming you, just so you know."

"They can't have you, you're already mine, doll."

"Of course. Take a left here and go to the end of the road."

I pulled onto a gravel road and the trees got thick enough around it that it was pretty dark outside the car. I pulled up behind the other vehicles and parked. We got out and I saw Sarah tuck the kit under her arm like a purse. She had her phone out and was following the locator dot. I stayed on her right and through the trees we could see a bonfire and campsite with probably around 100 people just in the light of the fire. Now I knew why she needed the locator. In the flickering light, it would take too much time to try and spot one small blond in the crowd.

"Stick near me. Make it clear we're a couple and most of them will leave you alone." She glanced back at me and edged her way through the crowd. I kept a hand on the small of her back and followed her, trying not to make eye contact with the giggling girls that were deliberately rubbing up against me. I had never been groped so much in my life. Some of them were pretty bold and tried to get between me and Sarah when we would have to pause because of the crowd. I tried to ignore them, increasingly uncomfortable with the hands stroking my arms, grabbing my ass and squeezing my cock through my jeans. 

We finally made it through the worst and headed off for one of the darker areas where people were standing, visiting and drinking beer from plastic cups. Sarah kept on going past that group until she was completely in the dark. I heard a phone ringing and looked over to see a muffled light against the ground. I picked it up to see Sarah's picture on it. 

"Sarah. Is this Chloe's?" She looked at it and groaned before tucking it into her jeans pocket.

"Yes. Damn it, where are you guys? I'm calling Jace." She held her phone up to her ear briefly. "It's just going to voicemail. I didn't see anyone I knew earlier in the crowd. I'm going to try tracking his phone. Do you see anyone out here?"

I looked around where I had seen the phone. It looked like the dirt had been disturbed, but with this many intoxicated kids around, it was hard to tell if it was anything more than foot traffic.

"I've got Jace's phone now. It's further into the woods and moving."

"I'm not liking this, Sarah. Let me lead, just tell me where to go."

"All right, but only because I don't have my full range of motion back yet. Keep going straight."

We walked into the dark forest. I have excellent night vision, but there wasn't anything other than trees. Sarah touched my left shoulder and we turned, making a wide loop back to the bonfire area. I could suddenly hear voices up ahead and I stopped short. Sarah must have heard them too because she talked quietly in my ear.

"He should be near here. The signal's pretty strong now."

"I hear people talking, Sarah – and I'm not liking what they're saying."

"Let's go. I'll follow you. My eyes have adjusted and I can see all right now."

We moved up closer to a small clearing. There were three guys there standing around a prone Chloe. I recognized her dress from earlier. I couldn't see Jace, but I assumed he was unconscious as well. 

"What are you waiting for? Dude, she's out. Let's do it now."

"What'd you do to her boyfriend?"

"He's over there under that tree. Had to give him some Special K. Didn't think he'd put up that much of a fight. Punk might've broke my nose."

"Quit whining and go keep a lookout. I'm first this time; you got the last one." I stepped out into the clearing as the first guys started to undo his pants. This kind of scum pissed me off. No one deserved what they were going to do to that girl. One guy came at me, intending to punch me. I knocked him out in one hit and quickly moved to the second guy. I heard Sarah come up to the one by Chloe and heard him scream as I knocked out my guy. I looked over, knowing she had things under control. She must have kicked him in the balls because he was curled up on the ground.

"Who are you?"

"Nnnoobody!"

"What were you planning on doing to this girl?"

"Nothing! I wasn't going to do nothing, I swear!"

"That's right, because you're going to need a testicle retrieval after this, scumbag." She stomped down on his leg, breaking it. He screamed. "What did you use on her?" He didn't answer right away, so she kicked him again.

"Last chance. What did you give her?"

"Just a roofie, that's it!"

"That had better be it." She punched him hard, knocking him out.

"Steve, can you find Jace? I need to get this in her." She laid out the drug reversal kit and was pulling out what she needed. I moved over to where the scum had pointed and found Jace. He was unconscious but breathing fine. I rolled him on his back and checked him for broken bones. His hands were bruised from beating on the trash, but otherwise he was fine. I picked him up and brought him over to where Sarah was getting ready to inject Chloe with something. 

"Can you hold the light for me? I have to get this in a vein."

"What are you giving her?"

"Flumazenil. It will help counter the drug they gave her. She's not very big, so it wouldn't have taken much to affect her." She slid the needle in the vein and gave Chloe a couple milliliters of a clear liquid. She capped the needle and set the syringe back on the kit. 

"It'll take at least a minute for it to kick in. How's Jace?"

"Out cold. What's Special K?"

"Ketamine. A general anesthetic narcotic. He'll need Narcan, then. I don't think its wise to wait around here for it to wear off." She pulled a thin carpuject out of the kit and screwed on the plunger. She found Jace's vein and injected the whole syringe. She set the supplies back on the kit. 

"He should come around pretty quick. I'm hoping they didn't give him much." She turned her attention back to Chloe, who was starting to stir.

"Chloe? Can you hear me?" she used her phone to shine light on Chloe's face while I kept an eye on Jace, who suddenly took a deep breath and opened his eyes, trying to sit up. 

"Jace, it's Steve. Just stay down for a minute, let yourself adjust. What do you remember?"

"Steve. Steve...Chloe, is she okay?"

I looked over at Sarah, who nodded. She was giving Chloe another dose from the syringe.

"Yeah, she'll be okay. Some jerk drugged her, but we found you before anything could happen. What do you remember? Start with when you called Sarah."

"I don't know. I remember talking to Sarah and then Chloe passed out on me not very long after that. I was trying to get her to wake up when I heard a couple of guys, maybe 2 or 3 of them talking shit about how they wanted to get with Chloe. I think I fought with them, got in a couple of good hits when I suddenly felt really tired and heavy." He tried to sit up again and I let him this time. He rubbed his hands over his face. "It was weird. I hadn't drank that much – I just couldn't shake the foggy feeling. I couldn't make my arms cooperate to land my punches and I think I took a hit to the head. That's all I know." We looked over at Chloe, who was just starting to wake up. 

"Chloe, can you hear me?" Sarah asked. Her eyes were open and struggled to focus. She blinked rapidly and her body convulsed. Sarah rolled her to her side and she retched, emptying her stomach. Sarah rubbed her arm soothingly.

"It's okay; I'm here now. Just get it out of your system and you'll feel better." Sarah signaled me to take Jace a little further away. I pulled him to his feet and held onto him until I was sure he wouldn't fall down.

"Come on, buddy. You need to move around a little bit, burn that stuff out of your system."

"Those guys gave me something, didn't they? While we were fighting?" We walked slowly around the clearing. I kept one hand under Jace's elbow so I could catch him if he fell.

"Yeah. They gave you a shot of ketamine, I guess. If they got the jump on you and it was three on one, they had the means to do it."

"Did they... do... anything to Chloe?"

"No. We got here before they could. Thanks for calling when you did. We left Sarah's right after she talked to you."

"I should have done more. I should have been able to fight them."

"You did fight them, long enough to buy us enough time to get here. We found Chloe's phone a ways from here, so they had to have carried or dragged you both back here to get you further away from the crowd. You were close enough before that people would have heard if either of you woke up."

"I just...she's my friend. I should be able to protect her." He met my eyes I put my hand on his shoulder, giving it a light squeeze.

"You did protect her. Sometimes calling in the reinforcements is the best thing you can do. You were smart about it – you stayed with her when you saw she was acting strange and called us to come get you. I'm guessing you've been drinking, too, so you couldn't drive and while you might have been able to carry her back to your truck, she would be dead weight and unless you have had some practice, it's harder than it looks to carry someone who doesn't weight that much less than you. You're probably 160 pounds, right?"

"165."

"She probably weighs around 120. And this isn't exactly well lit level ground. You would have a tough time navigating this terrain carrying a person and not running you both into a tree. You did good, kid. Seriously. I'm just glad you both are going to be okay."

"How did you guys find us?"

"Sarah tracked your phones. We picked up Chloe's from where you started out and then she tracked yours. They didn't know you had called us or that anyone was coming after you two so quickly."

I heard Sarah call my name, so we walked back into the clearing. Chloe was sitting up, but when we got closer, I could see she was pale and shaking.

"We need to get her back to my house," said Sarah in a low voice. "She doesn't want to go to the hospital and I think she'll be fine once she gets some water and sleep."

"Chloe, it's Steve. Can you walk or should I carry you?"

"Walk." She groaned. "Tell the trees to move so I can get up."

"Chloe, if I carry you we can get you back to Sarah's sooner so you can get some rest."

"Okay. Sarah, can Steve carry me?"

"Better than I can at the moment."

"Not what I meant."

"Chloe, I would rather he carried you than you trip and break an ankle. He's really strong. He won't drop you, I promise."

"Oh. Good. I don't like to be dropped. It hurts."

I knelt down by Chloe and gathered her in my arms. She laid limply in my arms and rested her head on my shoulder. Sarah picked up the med kit and tucked it under her arm.

"Go ahead, Steve, Jace. I'll be right behind you. I just need to make sure I've got everything." I assumed she was going to find the drugs on those pervs and didn't want Chloe to notice them.

"How well do you know your way to the road?" I asked Jace. "I don't really want to run into anyone at the moment."

"Pretty well. We'll go this way, then," he pointed, looking back at Sarah, who made a shooing motion at him.

We were a little ways away when I heard a couple of sharp snaps and some thuds; a little bit after that I heard Sarah come jogging up to us.

"All set?" I asked her.

"Yup. I got most of it and they won't be going anywhere anytime soon...other than to the ER. Which should be interesting after I make a couple phone calls when we get home."

"I love it when you get creative." I chuckled quietly.

"You haven't seen anything yet," she replied, I could hear the satisfied smile in her voice.

We made it to the car without Chloe throwing up on me and I drove us back to Sarah's house. Sarah took Jace's keys from him and drove his truck, following us back. 

It was after midnight by the time we got back to Sarah's. She parked his truck in the road and after a short, quiet, conversation convinced Jace to stay the night, too. Jace and I went up to the guest room where he grabbed some sleeping clothes he kept there and went downstairs to go shower quick and I changed back into my shorts.


	17. Not an Ordinary Conversation

Sarah's POV

After we got upstairs, I got Chloe in the shower and went to go grab her some clothes. She used to stay over a lot, so there was a set of pj's for her in my closet. I grabbed hers and mine and went back into the bathroom. I brushed my teeth and stripped to get in the shower. Chloe and I had done this so many times we had a routine down. While I waited, I looked at my wound. It was healing nicely; the front was almost completely closed and the back looked a lot better than yesterday. By Monday, I should be good as new.

I heard the water shut off and went to grab Chloe a towel. She seemed steadier as she got out of the shower, which was good. I handed her another towel for her hair and turned to get in the shower. I heard Chloe gasp and looked back to see if there was a spider in the sink again; she hated spiders. I didn't see anything, so I looked at her, one eyebrow raised.

She cleared her throat and pointed at my wound. "Sarah Maria Evans, what happened to you?"

I grimaced. I had been hoping that she wouldn't notice. "I got shot again."

"And when were you planning on telling me about this?"

"Later, after it healed and it was just another crazy story."

"You're telling me everything as soon as you get out of the shower."

"I'm telling you what I can tell you when I get out of the shower."

"I'm holding you to that."

I laughed and started the shower. I heard Chloe moving around the bathroom and heard the door open and shut. I finished up and got out, drying off and pulling my hair up before putting on my tank top and shorts. I hung up my towel and padded to my room to see if she was in there. It was empty, so I grabbed my pillows and knocked on Steve's door. He didn't answer, so I opened it to see the room was empty as well. I grabbed his pillows too and went downstairs to the living room. That was usually where we camped when I had friends over. 

Chloe was hugging a bottle of Gatorade, chattering at Steve quietly. Jace had made popcorn and put in a movie. I tossed the pillows on the couch and Jace and Chloe briefly tussled over their favorite one before Jace let her win. I went to the hall cupboard to grab some blankets and set the stack on the couch. Steve raised an eyebrow at the fact that they were all Captain America themed and I laughed.

"Blame him." I pointed at Jace, who grinned, unrepentant. "I got cold easily when I was younger, so he gave me one every Christmas."

Chloe looked at them, realized what we were talking about, and started giggling. "I like you, Steve. You're my favorite hero after Iron Man."

"Chloe thinks he's hot." I said to Steve, straight faced. He burst out laughing as I sat down next to him

"Show Tony her picture and then tell her what he has to say about her," he said, smirking.

"Hah. I know better than that. There's a reason he's not married, you know."

"I do know. I believe he said something along the lines of 'there are so many of them and only one of me.' Nope, not humble at all. I am convinced he doesn't know what that word means." Steve speculated.

"Sarah, you know Tony Stark?" asked Chloe. "All this time you've been holding out on me?"

"Yup, for a whole 6 days now. Was going for seven and telling you over the phone to preserve my eardrums."

She playfully slugged me and I winced as she jarred my shoulder. Her eyes widened as she remembered the wound and pulled my shirt strap down to look at it. "That looks pretty bad, Sarah. What happened?"

Jace stood up and came over to look at it, too. He knew I had it but not how bad it was. I had done a pretty good job of keeping it covered so far this weekend. He gestured for me to turn so he could see the exit wound. His cerulean eyes met mine and I looked away, not wanting to see what he thought. 

I looked at Chloe and shrugged, pulling back up my strap. "We were running this undercover op and I was on my way to the jet when a sniper took a crack at me. One of the team took him out, but I went down. Steve got me to the jet and helped patch me up."

"It went all the way through you? Didn't it?" she asked, eyes wide.

"Yeah. It's better that way, though. I really hate having to have someone dig bullets out of me."

"I second that," said Jace, sitting cross legged on the floor facing us. "I really hate digging bullets out of you." 

"I think I would rather not know," said Steve, giving me a look. I shrugged.

"Wrong place, wrong time. I was fine once he got it out. I couldn't reach it myself. Anyways, enough about me. Are you ready to watch the movie?"

"You're changing the subject." said Chloe.

"You betcha. It's after midnight – I'm tired and ready to eat popcorn and relax. Aren't you? You both had a busier day than I did." I reached over to snatch a handful from the bowl next to Jace. 

Chloe looked at me, considering for a moment and then shrugged. "I suppose. Start the movie, Jace. What are you doing tomorrow... I mean today?"

"We have church at 9:30 and Uncle Kev's coming to dinner tomorrow before we have to drive back."

Jace found the DVD remote and started the movie, Gnomeo and Juliet. I got up to get a glass of water and turned off the kitchen lights and the living room lights before going back to the couch to sit next to Steve. Jace had moved up to the couch from the floor, so we were all comfortably snug on the couch.

 

* * *

Steve's POV

Sarah nodded off on my shoulder not long into the movie, so I pulled her onto my lap and she curled up with her head on my chest. Jace had slouched down and was snoring lightly. Chloe was curled up on her end of the couch, leaning on the arm. I fell asleep some time after that, only to wake up when Sarah eased off my lap and went in the kitchen. I followed her, only to see her drinking a glass of water.

"How are you feeling?" I asked as I got a glass out of the cupboard and filled it at the tap.

"Fine, just thirsty."

"So did Chloe remember anything?" I asked quietly, pulling her to me when she sat her glass down.

She shook her head. "No, she remembers finding Jace, but nothing after that until she woke up. Thank God Jace called when he did."

"I take it the local police busted the party and found three guys with concussions and broken legs?"

"Of course. I sent a message to the police station through the anonymous tip line on our way into town."

"What did you do with the drugs?"

"I left enough on each of them to get them in deep shit. I'm keeping the rest to test a couple things on them."

"An antidote?"

"Something like that. Thanks for coming with tonight. I wouldn't have been able to do that all on my own; and we would've been a lot slower getting out of there."

"I'm glad I was here to help."

"What did you and Jace talk about? I could hear your voices moving around the clearing but couldn't make out what you were saying."

"I just helped him realize that it wasn't his fault and he did all he could to protect her. He's a good kid. He'll make a great Agent." I kissed her forehead gently. "He knows more of what you can do than she does."

"Yes. He's spent a lot of weekends riding with me to meet sparring partners and sparring with me himself. I trust Jace completely, and he knows the most that I can tell him. Chloe – well, I love her, but she isn't great at keeping secrets. She knows I work for Shield and am faster and stronger than I should be, but she doesn't see what she doesn't want to see." Sarah hopped up on the counter and put her arms around my neck, "Chloe thinks I work as a low level agent and spend a lot of time at a desk, only going as backup on ops. I never intend to disabuse her of that notion. It's safer for us both if she stays in the dark." 

"I think you're right. Ready to go back to sleep?" I reached up and stroked her face gently. She nodded and I picked her up off the counter and carried her back to the living room. I tossed a pillow on the love seat and grabbed a blanket off the floor before laying down. Sarah curled up facing me and gave me a kiss before laying her head on my chest.

I held Sarah until she fell asleep again, just savoring the feel of her in my arms and breathing in her clean scent. I hadn't hardly slept last night; in the short week that I had known her, I had already gotten used to having her sleeping next to me. I was exhausted, but wasn't ready to sleep, not yet. Tonight's events had gotten under my skin and I simmered in anger.

If we'd been even a couple minutes later, I shuddered to think what could have happened to Chloe. No woman deserved to be attacked and used like that. Thank God I came home with Sarah this weekend or it could have been entirely possible that those scumbags would have tried to drug her as well. She probably would have went to the party with her friends, drank with them, chatting to others. 

As beautiful as she was, Sarah attracted attention everywhere she went, whether she noticed it or not. I'd seen with my own eyes how the guys at the party had looked at her, only seeing her for her body. It was the same way most people looked at me, seeing only Captain America instead of Steve Rogers.

I took a deep breath, willing myself to calm down. Everything had turned out all right in the end. Neither of her friends had been seriously injured and I'd seen how levelheaded Sarah could be during a crisis. We were all trained in the use of reversal meds, but she'd been treating them before I'd even known what had knocked them out.

I struggled to come to terms with my feelings for Sarah; she'd already come to mean a lot to me. Before I met her, I'd only been existing in this time. Because of her, I was finally starting to live again. I was feeling emotions again instead of passing the days in a dull numbness. I was certainly attracted to Sarah, and I knew she was attracted to me as well. As a product of this time, she was much bolder than the women I'd known in the 40's, letting me know each time we made out that she wanted more than that, she wanted to explore the physical side of our relationship. I wanted to as well, but I needed to figure out a few things first. I knew there were precautions we would need to take, and given how inexperienced we both were, I would need to talk to Natasha or Clint first and do a little research. 

I found myself thinking about Peggy again. There were still moments when my memories of Peggy caused me to feel something so strongly it stopped me in my tracks. I'd always treasure my memories of Peggy, but my time with her was almost over. My time with Sarah was just beginning, and for the first time in my long life, I had the chance to have a real relationship, something I'd always wanted. I didn't know the first thing about them, but with Sarah, it was bound to be an adventure, and I looked forward to it even as I was terrified of it.

I must have drifted off not long after Sarah fell asleep because I woke up before dawn feeling well rested. I looked over at the couch and saw that Chloe was still curled up on her end of the couch. Jace was awake and studying me and Sarah. 

"You really do care for her, don't you? She's not just a replacement for Peggy?" Jace said quietly, moving over to the end of the couch closest to the love seat so we could talk and I shifted slightly so I could see him. Sarah's even breathing told me she was still fast asleep. In the pre-dawn light, I could see that this was something he needed an answer to.

"She was never a replacement for Peggy. She may resemble her physically, but she is nothing like Peggy otherwise; her personality is radically different. Peggy was very British and quite...reserved, in more ways than one."

"Sarah's the opposite – she's openly friendly, a little snarky,"Jace said. "She's one of a kind. I would do anything for her, no hesitation."

"She's said the same about you." I smiled wryly. "It's been good for me to get to know you, Jace. You're very similar to Bucky in a lot of ways; I'll be honest, there are moments when I'm not sure who it is that I'm seeing."

"When Sarah said she was bringing you here, I didn't think about how this would affect you. I mean I've heard stories about you and Bucky from my grandpa and his siblings my whole life, but after meeting you, I know there's more to those stories."

"I never thought it would be that hard until today. It's helped, seeing how close you and Sarah are; Peggy and Bucky were never close like that. They worked together because they had to, but they weren't friends, not like you and Sarah are."

"Do you still love Peggy?"

"Yes and no. I do, but in a different way than I did in 1945. When I visit her, we talk like old friends, but that...spark...isn't there anymore. She moved on and married a good man, had a family, founded Shield. We don't have as much in common as we did 70 years ago, I guess. Time changes things, but she's still a treasured friend."

"What are your intentions with Sarah? She said you weren't dating."

"I'd like to date her; you don't find a woman like her every day."

"Steve, I've never seen her look at a guy the way she looks at you. Most of the time she never even sees the guys that try to get her to notice them; she never thinks they're looking at her."

"I am starting to see that, but I don't understand why. She's strikingly beautiful; the first time I met her, it felt like the wind was knocked out of me."

"For the record, that feeling doesn't ever really go away; it still happens to me when she gives me that huge smile and catches me...unprepared...sometimes." He gave me a crooked little grin and it was so like Bucky's that my heart hurt suddenly.

"Good to know."

"You're a pretty good looking guy yourself, Steve. If you guys ever had kids they would be freaking adorable."

I closed my eyes and suddenly I could see it and I wanted it – a family with her – more than anything. I'd thought about having that with Peggy after the war ended, but that mild desire from back then was nothing compared to the ferocity of this feeling. I knew Jace was watching me, so I tried to shake it off until I'd time to think things through.

"You've been hanging around Sarah too much if you're jumping subjects like that," I said, shaking my head.

"You don't want to have kids?" he asked, studying my response; he wasn't fooled by my attempt at a blasé tone.

"I don't know; I haven't really thought about it. Family, stability – the guy that wanted all that went into the ice almost 70 years ago. I think someone else came out." 

Sarah shifted suddenly and opened her eyes. "Steve, are you okay? You tensed..." her voice was still rough with sleep.

"Yeah. I'm fine." I looked down and she blinked sleepily at me. "It's not time to get up yet; you can go back to sleep for a while, if you'd like." I stroked her face softly and she smiled, closing her eyes again. I looked over at Jace, who was watching us with a crooked smile, sure he was seeing more than I had intended. He waited until he was sure she was sleeping to speak.

"I think you're still the same guy that you were back then; you just have a lot to adjust to. Just be good to her; I'll kick your ass if you break her heart."

"I have no intention of ever hurting her."

"No one ever does," he replied. I raised one eyebrow and he shook his head. "You've got some stuff to work through and it hurts her when you don't know who she is. She wouldn't want me to tell you that, but I think you need to know."

"I haven't known her for long, but I already can't imagine life without her." I gave him a small smile, shaking my head slightly. "Ever since I became Captain America, that's all that people have ever seen when they look at me. But her, she sees me for who I am, Steve Rogers, the guy from Brooklyn I started out as."

"You think she's only attracted to you because of a suit and a shield?"

"Not really; she didn't treat me like Captain America, but she didn't know who I was, either."

"And once she did? Did it matter?"

"She told me she wasn't sure if she wanted to get involved with someone she works with."

"Doesn't look that way to me," Jace said, smirking. "She looks pretty involved at the moment. Did she give you a reason why she said that?" 

"I may have told her I didn't want her to do her job because I didn't want to risk her getting hurt." I said sheepishly.

Jace raised his eyebrows and shook his head. "Steve, I feel the need to inform you that you never tell a woman that – ever."

"I figured that one out myself," I said as he laughed quietly. "She didn't take it very well." 

"I'm sure she didn't." Suddenly, the grin was gone from his face. "I heard you saw her get shot right in front of you."

"I thought she was gone," I said quietly, feeling that fear all over again. "It felt like someone had reached a hand in my chest and stopped my heart." I glanced down at her peaceful face. "I thought I'd found her only to lose her."

"She's more resilient than you think."

I heard footsteps on the stairs and looked over to the doorway to see Sarah's mom poke her head in. Her eyes widened slightly at the sight of her daughter curled up asleep on top of me and her jaw dropped. A glance at the couch showed Jace pretending to sleep.

I met her gaze, surprised to see approval there. I closed my eyes again and heard her walk into the kitchen. I smelled coffee a little bit later and gave up trying to sleep. I shifted Sarah so she would be laying on the love seat and got up to go into the kitchen.

"Morning, Steve."

"Good morning, Mrs Evans."

She handed me a mug of coffee and I went to go sit at the table. She came to join me after pouring herself another cup.

"Call me Betty, Steve. What time did you all get back last night?"

"Around midnight. It took longer than we thought to find them."

"Did you enjoy your time with the Barnes'?"

"I did. I haven't seen Becky, John or Benji since '43. I think they were around the twins' age when I joined the army."

"Roger said it meant a lot to them to see you again. They thought you died when Bucky did, after all. Your bodies were never recovered; not until you were found a couple months ago."

"I should have been able to save him."

"At what cost?" she asked shrewdly. "Let me play devil's advocate for a bit. Let's say you somehow did manage to reach Bucky before he fell. Would you have tossed him back into the train only to be lost yourself – because he wouldn't have wanted that, would he?" 

The scales fell from my eyes and I wanted to kick myself. She understood not only me, but Bucky better than I thought. "No, he wouldn't. He would've kicked my butt for pulling a stunt like that. It's just that up until I became what I am now, I never thought I'd have to live without him. Bucky, though, Bucky did. I was always so sick back then, Betty. Every birthday was one more than I thought I'd have. I never thought I'd see 25, let alone 94."

"If there's one thing I've learned, hindsight is 20/20. Would you have tried as hard to take down Hydra if Bucky had been with you? I'm married to a History professor – I've read the reports, I've watched Sarah, Jace and their friends meticulously reenact your last battle. The SSR should have lost – they were outgunned, outnumbered, and outmaneuvered in every way. Your determination and sheer force of will turned the tide, Steve. Ending Hydra effectively ended the war." She put her hand on mine, waiting for me to meet her eyes. "Bucky will always be with you in your memories, but sometimes your heart needs a little more time to accept what your mind already knows. Your mind knows Bucky's been gone for 67 years, your heart says it wasn't that long ago." She patted my hand, her eyes telling me that she understood what I was saying.

I nodded, taking a sip of my coffee before attempting to speak, the lump in my throat choking me. "It feels like yesterday. I know it wasn't but that's how it feels to me."

"Have you talked to anyone about this, Steve?"

"I try not to."

"You're need to learn how to deal with your grief if you're ever going to move on. You've heard the saying when one door closes another opens?"

"Yes," I said, waiting for her to continue, but she didn't. I heard someone walking into the kitchen and pour a cup of coffee.

"Good." She let go of my hand, looking over my shoulder with a smile. 

"Morning Mami." Jace bussed her cheek before sitting down with his cup of coffee.

"Morning Jace. Have a good time last night?"

"Not really. Kendra was there with her new guy." Ah, so that was the reason for the slight sadness I had been reading from him earlier.

"Oh. I'm sorry to hear that. Sarah said she didn't care much for whatever-his-name-is. You must not have met anyone memorable last night, then."

"Nope. It's fine Mami, really. I leave for Ops soon. I'm not going to have time for a girlfriend for a while anyway."

"Jace, honey; it doesn't make your heart hurt any less just because your brain knows better."

He gave her a small, bittersweet smile. "I know."

I looked over to see Sarah leaning on the doorway, listening for a moment before she came padding over to me. She curled up in my lap, her head on my shoulder, one arm around my neck. 

"My pillow went missing," she grumbled and I thought I heard Jace smother a laugh as her mother chuckled.

"Sorry. I smelled coffee and went to investigate."

"You're forgiven. Coffee smells good," she slid off me to go get a cup and came back to the table, taking the open chair next to me. 

"Morning Mom, Jace."

"Morning honey. Did you sleep well?"

"Like a rock. Steve makes a good pillow."

"So I see." Sarah's mom got up and started making breakfast. Sarah went to go try to help only to be shooed back to the table. She shook her head and grinned, but came to sit back down. I could tell when she noticed Jace's bruised knuckles because she put her hand out and pulled one of his hands to her. She ran her fingers over his knuckles gently, a slight frown on her face. He pulled his hand back, shaking his head slightly and gesturing at Mrs Evans. She gave him a look, but didn't say anything. 

The smell of sausage brought Chloe slowly padding into the kitchen, yawning and making a beeline for the coffee. She perched on the same chair as Sarah, sharing it like she had with Jace yesterday. The two of them fit on it quite better than Sarah and Jace had yesterday. I heard the front door open and shut and then Mr Evans came into the kitchen, morning paper in his hand. 

"Morning everyone."

"Morning Dad," said Sarah, blowing on her coffee. "Did we wake you up when we came home last night?"

"No, I heard you come in and went back to sleep. Things get rowdy too soon for you, Chloe?" he looked over at her as she leaned her head on Sarah's shoulder. I got the impression that Chloe was not a morning person.

"Yeah, guys were getting into fights and stuff. We'd had a couple of drinks by then, so I figured I should call Sarah for a ride."

"Good girl. I'm glad you weren't drinking and driving. No sense doing something stupid when someone could come get you."

"Right, Papi."

I glanced at the headline when he sat it down to go get his coffee, but it was only a feature on yesterday's graduation ceremony.


	18. I Don't Dance

Sarah's POV

Soon enough, breakfast was over and Chloe went upstairs to get her stuff before she went home. She gave Steve a hug, surprising him. I promised her I'd call later that week as I gave her a hug at the door. I went back into the kitchen to talk to Jace while Steve went upstairs to get ready for church. We walked out the patio door and I shut it behind us before giving him a firm hug. He held me tight for a long time. 

"I'm going to miss you, Jace," I murmured into his neck.

"I'll see you in a couple weeks, Sarah. Thanks for bringing Steve with you. It really meant a lot to my grandpa and his siblings."

"Any time. I think it was just as good for him, too."

"Be nice to Steve and try not to confuse him too much by being a girl."

"You're taking his side?" I pulled back a bit so I could see Jace's expressions. His cerulean eyes were serious, which was a bit of a change from his normal façade. 

"Of course. He has no idea what he's getting into with you."

"You say that like it's a bad thing. I'm just as clueless as he is about how relationships really work."

"He cares a lot for you, you know. I talked to him a bit last night, while you were helping Chloe. I can see why you like him."

"I do like him, Jace; I like him a lot, which is kinda crazy since I haven't known him for that long. I really only met him a week ago."

"He's a good guy – I don't think you could find a better guy than him, Sarah. Not that you need it, but I approve." 

"Thanks. Now we just need to find you a decent woman. No more hoe-bags. You need someone you can trust if you're going to be an agent."

"I think I just need to be single for a while, decide what it is that I'm looking for."

"You do that. I'll call you sometime this week. Bye Jace." I put my arms around his torso and squeezed him tight.

"Bye Sarah. No more getting shot." He squeezed back and I let him go with a grin. 

"No promises," I said with a smirk.

I heard him laugh as I turned to go inside. I had just enough time to shower and get ready before we needed to leave for church.

We rode with my parents to St. Paul's. Steve had mentioned he was also Catholic when I told him we would be going to church on Sunday, and he was interested in seeing my church. It was a little ostentatious, but it had some beautiful stained glass windows. It was built in the style of the classic Roman cathedrals that were common here in the east. 

We dipped our right hands in the holy water and made the sign of the cross. Steve followed my parents and me in, genuflecting and pulling out the kneeler. We were early enough that they were still saying the rosary, so I joined in after a couple minutes of silent prayer. 

Steve joined in shortly after that and we finished out the prayers. Sitting back in the pew, I pointed out the board with the numbers for the songs and leafed through the song book, happy to see that some of my favorites were on for today. I liked to sing, but it was not one of my gifts. Steve, surprisingly enough, was an excellent baritone and a good ear.

Father was inspired this weekend and the sermon was an excellent one, speaking mainly to the graduated seniors, but also to Steve. He spoke of making choices and moving forward, how God would always be there for us, exhorting us to go out and live, making the most of our time on earth. I reached for Steve's hand when I saw the repressed emotions flicker across his face and he twined his fingers with mine, not letting go until he had to.

We shook Father's hand on our way out and Steve said something to him in Latin which he replied to in kind, a smile on his face. I didn't speak Latin, but I understood the exchange, smiling at Steve as he took my hand and we walked to the car.

Uncle Kevin was just pulling up in front of the house when we got back. I ran to greet him, giving him a big hug and it was a long moment before he let go of me. I pulled Kevin over to meet Steve and grinned when he gave me a sidelong look.

"I should really stop being surprised by the things you do or the people you know, tiger," Kevin said as he let me drag him along, my arm linked with his.

"It's good for you every now and again. Otherwise you get too set in your ways," I teased/

"What did you do to your right shoulder? You're moving a little gingerly today."

I sighed, knowing he could easily find out even if I didn't tell him. "Got shot on a mission. Sniper hid from my team and got in a lucky shot before he bit it. Steve got me back to the jet and helped patch me up. It's almost healed, Kev; I'll be good as new by tomorrow night."

"Same place you got shot last time? Did you tell your mom this time?"

I touched my shoulder where the entrance wound was. "Higher. Went all the way through this time, and no, I know better than to tell Mom. She'll just get all worried for no good reason and call me 20 times a day for the next week."

"Is that what Jace was talking about yesterday?" asked Steve, looking at me curiously.

"Noooo. That was a different time and on the other shoulder."

"I thought you said you actively avoided bullets?"

"I do, they just don't always avoid me," I groused. "Where's Magneto when I want him around?"

Kevin and Steve laughed as we went in the house. I went upstairs to go change into normal clothes and pack quickly as Steve and Kevin talked in the living room. I set my bag by the door on my way down and went back into the living room to see what they were talking about. 

Steve was asking him about Ops Academy and the kinds of things that Agents would learn there; I wasn't sure if he was asking about me or Jace. Standard program was 2-4 years depending on the level of the cadet. I learned quickly and soon spent more time on missions than in the classrooms. I was one of the youngest agents at Shield; most people with my language and fighting skills were much older than I'd been when I started and were often ex-military. It was a hard program, and not everyone finished. I'd been working with Jace for several years and I was sure that he had what it took to make it through. 

 

* * *

Steve's POV

As I pulled out of the driveway, I looked over to see Sarah waving goodbye to her parents and Director Gregg until we were out of sight.

"Thanks for bringing me with you this weekend," I said as she leaned back into the leather seat.

"You're welcome, Steve. What did you think of Princeton?"

"It's not bad – as far as Jersey goes," I said with a smile.

"Spoken like a true New Yawker," she drawled, laying on a Brooklyn accent and giggling. "Seriously, though, what did you think."

"It seems like a nice little town. Your parents were both very pleasant and from what I've seen, you have some very loyal friends."

"Dad said you talked to him," she said hesitantly. "You don't need my parent's permission, Steve."

"Your dad was concerned about the age difference at first, but your mom said she 'ships it' – whatever that means."

"Geez, Mom!" Sarah said with a groan, covering her face with her hands. "It means you imagine two people being in a relationship, for example, I totally ship Pepperony – Pepper and Tony – Tony came up with the name himself, by the way. I also ship Clintasha – Clint and Natasha."

"So shipping is a good thing?"

"I guess you could say that," she said as she pulled out her phone and typed rapidly. "I told her I can't believe she said that to you. So I take it my Dad's okay with it, if we decided that's what we wanted?"

"Yeah. He was a little surprised, I think. Then a little upset that you were old enough to date, and finally accepting of the idea."

"Does the age difference bother you?"

"No. You're not a normal 18 year old, and I can't say I'm a normal 94 year old guy. Would it bother you?"

"Not really. You're not exactly like most of the other 25 year old guys I've met."

"Is that good or bad?"

"Neither. You've never really gotten used to how different you are from the skinny, sick little guy you used to be, have you?"

"Not really. From the time I was enhanced, I was a part of the war effort and then I was in the field. Other than Peggy, I really didn't talk to many dames. I never knew what to say. I've already talked to you more than all of the other women I've ever met, other than maybe my Ma."

"Somehow, I'm not surprised, but that makes sense now. Around the guys, you're fine, you're yourself. Around me, Nat and Maria, though, you're pretty socially awkward. You were almost scared of Chloe when she was aggressively trying to flirt with you."

"I didn't want her to think I was interested in her when I really wasn't or for you to think that either. The only gal I'm interested in is you, Sarah."

She studied me for a moment, and I could feel her gaze on me as I navigated the way out of town.

"What are you thinking?"

"A lot of things. Why are you interested in me, Steve? Why not Maria or Kate?"

I glanced over at her as I drove to see her watching me, a pensive look on her beautiful face as I gave some thought about her question, trying to put my answer into words. This wasn't an idle musing on her part, she genuinely needed to know.

"Well, Maria is technically my superior, and she's always just treated me like 'Captain Rogers,' not a man. I respect her, but I don't... I'm not..." I struggled to find the words but Sarah cut me off with a gesture.

"I get it, you're not into Maria like that. What about Kate? She's nice."

"I think I've talked to her twice, maybe. She's nice, but there's nothing about her that draws me to her, not like you." I took a deep breath before continuing. "If I don't see her – or any other girl – for long periods of time, it doesn't bother me. It's just something about you, Sarah." I smiled at her, reaching out one hand to take hers in mine. "From the first day I met you, I wanted to get to know you, spend time with you, talk to you. When you're not around, I think about you – wonder what you're doing, what you're thinking."

"If we do decide that we want to date, I think we need some boundaries."

"Like what?"

"Like no PDA at work."

"PDA? What's that?"

"Public displays of affection – kissing, holding hands, that kind of stuff. I'd rather keep our relationship...private...if we have one."

"What's wrong with holding hands?" I asked, squeezing hers lightly.

"You and the rest of the Avengers are my superiors, Steve; I'm technically part of your support staff. Just like you wouldn't put the moves on Maria, I don't want everyone at the Triskelion analyzing our relationship just yet. I've only been there a couple weeks now and hold a position that's already ruffled a lot of feathers and made a lot of people jealous. If they see us kissing, they're going to think the only reason I have the job I do is because I'm dating you."

"Oh. I think I understand what you mean now."

"Good, because this week I start training with Strike 1 and 2."

I wasn't thrilled at the idea of her working with some of the guys on those teams, but I simply asked, "Whose idea was that?"

"Fury's – and Maria's. They want me to be able to work with any and all of them as needed."

"So you'd be going out on missions with them?" I asked, feeling more than a little apprehensive of her going into the field again without me.

"Yes. I've yet to meet all of them, but I don't want them to see me as 'Captain America's girlfriend' until they've had time to get used to working with me."

"Because you don't think they'll respect you?"

"Steve, I'm a smallish young woman. Do I look like I could knock a man out or break bones with a punch?"

I looked at her like I'd never seen her before and shook my head. "Not if I didn't know better."

"I hope you're comfortable watching be fight them, because I've run into a little resistance from Agent Rumlow, so I'm going to have to prove myself to every single one of those guys."

"Starting when?"

"Tomorrow. I'm healed enough for that. I won't be able to spar with you for a couple more days yet, but that's just because I know how strong you are and how hard you're capable of hitting."

"Sarah, I don't think I'll ever be comfortable fighting you. I could seriously hurt you." I knew what I was capable of - even if I had yet to use my full strength against anyone in this time yet.

"You've sparred with Natasha before, right?"

"Yes, at her insistence – and I still hurt her."

"Steve, you're not understanding me. You're going to have to spar with me in front of the team – no special treatment. We both need to know how the other moves in order to figure out how we'll work best together. I've started working on a new program for the holo-trainer so that we can run almost all of Strike 1, 2 and the Avengers in it at the same time for training exercises." 

What she was saying sounded reasonable, but I wasn't completely convinced that it was a good idea until a thought occurred to me. "So the next time we go on a mission, will you take orders from me?"

"As long as they don't countermand my direct orders from Fury or Maria. There will be times when I'll have a specific job to do and you're going to have to let me do it – without complaint. If it makes you feel better, Wednesday was the first time I'd been injured on a mission in three months."

"How many missions were in that time?"

She thought for a moment, counting on her fingers. "Eighteen or nineteen, I think. Most of them under cover ones."

"Does this mean you'd consider going on a date with me?" 

Her lips quirked, "What did you have in mind?"

"Dinner and a play, unless you don't care for theater?" I almost held my breath, unsure of how she'd respond.

She grinned widely. "I love going to the theater. When?"

"Great. How about tomorrow?"

"Can't wait." 

After the long, emotionally draining weekend, it was nice to get back to my apartment. Sarah was ready to get in a workout, so she changed and headed downstairs to the basement. I needed to make a couple calls to get things set up for our date and unpack. Natasha left me a text telling me to call her sometime after we left Princeton, so I needed to do that as well.

By the time I made it downstairs, Sarah was finishing her warm-up sequence and finally looked around when she sank into her splits. She grinned at me in the mirror before standing up and walking over to me. She took my hand in hers, tugging me onto the wooden floor. A slower song came on that I didn't recognize.

"I believe this is my dance," she reached up and put her arms around my neck. 

 

* * *

Steve's POV

I shook my head at her, not really sure what to do. "I don't know how to dance, Sarah. I never learned how."

She stroked my face lightly before bringing her hands down to mine. "Then follow my lead. This one's easy, just swaying from side to side." 

She put my hands on her hips and led us in a slow circle. I smiled down at her, letting her pull me closer, laying her head on my chest. I put my arms around her as we slowly rotated on the dance floor. The music changed and she shifted, taking one of my hands in hers and resting the other one on my shoulder. 

"I've got this one down, I think," I said when she pulled back enough to see my face.

She grinned in a way I was learning to mistrust. "It's a start. One of these days we'll go to a club and dance there. It's different than this but still fun."

"I'll take your word on that," I said as I leaned down and kissed her until we were breathless, feeling her melting into me as we stopped dancing. Eventually she pulled back, resting her head on me while our pulses slowed again. 

"Do you mind if I do some ballet so I don't get rusty?"

"Not at all; I'd like to watch you dance, if you don't mind."

"Be my guest," she said with a smile, letting go of me.

I retreated to the edge of the wooden floor, taking a seat in a chair there as she went over to her phone to start her music. I watched as she leapt onto the floor and danced with an intensity I hadn't expected. I clapped when the music stopped and she rose out of her final position, skipping over to me. 

"What did you think?"

"Looked great to me," I said, smiling. "If you want a knowledgeable opinion, you'll have to talk to Natasha. She used to dance with a ballet company back in Russia when she was younger."

"I will later; right now I'm going to go shower." 

"Anything you need to do tonight?" I asked, glancing over at her.

"Not really. Do you want to watch the rest of the movie we started last week?" Sarah asked as we started up the stairs.

"Sounds good. Your place or mine?" I asked, giving her the choice.

"Yours," Sarah said after a moment. "The movie's already there anyways. See you in a little bit."

 

* * 

My heart about beat its way out of my chest when I saw what Sarah decided to wear for pajamas tonight, a dark blue, silky, thin-strapped nightgown that barely came to mid-thigh. I'm pretty sure my jaw dropped the minute she took off the long thin sweater-robe she wore over her pajamas and set it aside.

She tapped my jaw into place as she approached, pressing herself to me before giving me a kiss. I ran my hands up and down her back over her silky nightgown and I realized she wasn't wearing anything at all underneath it. I groaned quietly as my cock started to harden at the feel of her body so close to mine and I tried not to think about how soft her skin felt or how her firm breasts pressed against my chest. She tilted her head up to look at me and cupped my face with one hand, playing with my short blond hair before sliding her hands down my torso to my hips. 

"Not that I'm complaining, but what brought this on?"

She grinned, tongue flicking out to wet her lower lip. "I need a reason to kiss you?"

I shook my head. "No, of course not." 

I inhaled deeply when one thin strap slid off her shoulder as she leaned forward, my height allowing me an unparalleled view of her cleavage. Her breasts were barely covered by the thin fabric, but she ignored that, pushing me back as she deepened the kiss. I sat abruptly when the back of my calves hit the couch and she pushed me back one more time. To my surprise, she straddled me, kneeling over me so she could kiss me again, working her way down my neck and sinking her weight down until she was pressing down firmly on my erection.

The breathy little noises she was making against my skin were driving me crazy. Her hands slid under my shirt, pulling it up and off me. I took control of the kiss this time, working down her neck to her shoulder, kissing gently where her injuries...weren't. I grabbed the woman on my lap by her arms firmly, not wanting her to get away. 

"Who are you and what do you want?"

"I don't have a name, and as for what I want – well, that should be pretty obvious, Captain," her lips twisted into a smug smile. "I'd envy your girlfriend, but I'm pretty sure I've just done more with you than she has."

Just then I heard my door opening to show Sarah – the real Sarah – standing there in her usual pajamas holding her M&P 9 mm before lowering it and shutting the door.

"Mystique, I know I told you Steve was off limits." Sarah's voice was hard, almost cold. I'd never heard those tones from her before and I never wanted to hear them directed at me.

The woman on me sighed and rolled her eyes. "I stopped listening after Steve, pooka. I was just having a little fun."

"Get off him, Mysti!" Sarah huffed. "He's my boyfriend, not yours." 

She stuck her tongue out at Sarah, but thankfully got off my lap.

"What's going on, Sarah? You know this woman?" I asked, confused.

"Yeah, I know her. I've known her since I was little." Sarah tossed me my shirt and I quickly pulled it on. "Show him your true form, Mysti. Steve, do me a favor and don't freak out, okay?"

"Doll, why would I freak out?"

The two women shared a glance and the fake Sarah gave me a wicked grin. I watched as Sarah's features melted from the woman's form, leaving a naked woman with blue skin and red hair. I quickly looked away from her nudity, my cheeks flushing as the woman laughed at my actions. I reached for Sarah's sweater, handing it to the woman with my eyes averted from her. 

"Could you please put this on, ma'am?"

The woman laughed incredulously and Sarah sighed. "Just put it on. He won't look at you until you do."

"He's the original boy scout, isn't he?"

"Pretty much; stop toying with him and put it on."

"You can look now, soldier boy," Mystique said with a grating laugh.

I turned back to the women, studying her for the first time. "Who are you, ma'am?"

"My code name is Mystique. I'm a shapeshifter."

"So you can look like anyone?"

"Yes. Male, female, whoever I want to be, I can be from just a picture. I have to touch them to use their memories, their powers and their skills."

"Is there a specific reason why you were impersonating Sarah?" I asked.

She laughed. "She's my favorite person to pretend to be. How did you know I wasn't really her?"

"She was shot a couple days ago, and while she heals fast, she doesn't heal that fast."

Mystique sighed. "I knew I should've updated before testing it out on you, but I was getting impatient."

"This was a test?" I asked, appalled.

"Oops, did I say that out loud?" she said, shifting into a silent picture ingénue that I'd seen in a hundred different black and white films back in my day. 

"Sarah, I would greatly appreciate an explanation about now," I said, pinning her with a stern look.

"Mysti – I'll see you tomorrow, okay?" Sarah sighed, indicating the other woman should leave.

"Fine. You enjoy your hunk of a man and I'll meet you at Shield tomorrow afternoon. Who am I supposed to be again?"

"Surprise me," Sarah said flatly, giving her a look that raised the hairs on the back of my neck.

"Ohh, I will! Bye Steve, nice meeting you." With that, she vanished. Sarah came up to me and went up on tip toe to kiss my cheek. 

"Sorry, Steve. I wasn't expecting her to come by my apartment. I'm going to be working with her on her next mission, so Fury and Charles asked her to come by Shield so we'd have time to train together."

"I'm sorry, doll. I really thought she was you. I should've known you wouldn't act like that."

"Act like what? She didn't strip for you, did she? I'm going to kill her if she did." Sarah turned towards the door and took a step as if to follow.

"No!" I said quickly, grabbing Sarah's arm before she could go after the shapeshifter. "I'm just a little confused here by the whole situation, her pretending to be you."

Sarah studied me carefully. "Steve, I need you to loosen your grip, okay? You're holding me a little too tight right now." 

I let go of her immediately and she rubbed her arm where I'd been holding her. "I'm so sorry, doll. Are you okay?"

"Yeah. I'll be fine. Come here," she said, pulling me into a hug. "I'm sorry, Steve. If you want me to go, I'll go, okay?"

"Don't go!" I said, holding her tight. I buried my face in her hair, breathing in her perfume. "Why is your response always to run away from me?" 

"I don't know," she said quietly. "I don't have an answer to that question."

I kissed her forehead gently. "Please...stay."


	19. Exercise

Sarah's POV

I heard my alarm go off and reached over to hit snooze. Steve was already awake and looking at me, a soft smile on his face. Our limbs were tangled together and I could feel his hard length against my belly. I ran my hand over his chest, feeling the incredible muscle definition through his shirt. I never got tired of that; his muscles were definitely a major turn on for me.

"Morning," Steve said as he leaned down and kissed me leisurely.

"Mmm." I hummed in pleasure and detangled my limbs so I could sit up to stretch, testing out my shoulder. It felt better today; I could almost move my arm without pain. I leaned over and gave him a quick peck before getting out of bed. "See you in a bit. I'm going to go get ready for work."

I unplugged my charger and wrapped it around my phone, putting on my sweater before I grabbed my keys. I unlocked his door and checked the peephole to make sure the hall was clear before I let myself into the hallway and padded back to my apartment. 

I quickly finished my shower and brushed my teeth, looking at my shoulder in the mirror. The entrance wound was completely fleshed over now and was healing nicely. As for the exit wound, it was now all fleshed over, so the remainder of the healing would be internal. I was pleased with the progress it'd made; my shoulder still ached at times, but it wasn't as bad as yesterday. I would be fine for what I had planned for today – sparring with the Strike teams and keeping Mystique out of trouble.

* * *

Steve's POV  
I was uneasy about letting Sarah spar against the 12 guys from the Strike teams today, especially with her not being fully healed from her injury yet. I walked into the large gym with Barton, Romanoff and Hill; it was our job to observe today.

Sarah was just finishing her warm-up, which simultaneously encouraged the men to drop their guard as it made them aware that she was more than what she appeared to be. I caught the appreciative glances they threw her when they thought she wasn't looking, but she was oblivious to them; it made me want to hit them less. 

"Where's Rumlow," Clint asked Maria as we took our places.

"Not in DC," Maria replied vaguely, looking down at her clipboard. "He won't be back for a couple days, so he's missing out on the group exercises today."

"You sent him away or he was scheduled for a mission that didn't include the Strike teams?" Natasha asked shrewdly.

"Would I do something like that?"

"Of course. What'd he do to piss you off this time?" Clint asked. 

"He was breathing." Maria said flatly, shooting Clint a look.

I looked at her curiously. I'd noticed that Maria and Natasha didn't seem to care much for Rumlow and Clint wasn't a fan of him either. He wasn't exactly a friend, but he wasn't an enemy either. I had to work with him often when I went with the Strike teams and I'd had to learn how to tolerate him.

"So did we get a new guy recently?" I asked, mentally checking off the teams. "Who's the blond?"

"Agent Jake McCartney, Shield Special Forces. He been on our Strike shortlist for a while, so I asked him to come in for today's exercise."

"He's our neighbor," I said with a grin. "What's next, Hill? You going to recruit Kate too?"

Maria only smiled at me. "Depends - she got some skills I should know about, Rogers?"

"She's a nurse," I said, shaking my head, "but I thought you knew that already?"

"I do know," Maria said, raising an eyebrow. "Steve - you think Shield would allow you - of all people - to move into an apartment building without investigating who lives on your floor?"

"Maybe?" I said incredulously. 

"Think again, Rogers," Natasha said with a grin as Maria walked over to the group to start the exercise. "You're a national treasure; you should know better than that."

We watched as Maria told the group what she expected of them.

"Whatever happens, we're not to interfere, Steve." Clint reminded me. "It's just sparring - they all know the rules."

"I know. That doesn't mean I have to like it, but Sarah made me promise I'd stay out of it." 

* * *

Sarah's POV

I grabbed my bo off the floor, moving to the center of the gym. I knew the men had been watching me warmup while they stood around talking. They all were wearing their stealth suits with built in padding, helmets, and their bullet-proof vests. I'd insisted on those precautions so I didn't inadvertently injure any of them during this exercise. Maria had agreed after seeing the security footage of my fights with Natasha, Clint and Tony. 

"You ready, Evans?" Maria asked, giving me a once over. I was wearing one of my catsuits and my combat boots, my hair pulled back in a bun.

"Sure. I see you found someone to even up the odds." I said, gesturing at the group of men. "Thought I'd have to bribe someone who'd be willing to give it a try."

"Yeah, I did. Ex-military, well trained; he's usually with Special Forces, but he said he's interested in joining the Strike teams. The six man model is a good start, but I'd like to grow them gradually into two separate ten man teams without counting the Avengers."

"Works for me. How do you want me to do this?"

"Keep it to human speed as much as possible - like when you sparred with Clint and Tony. Disable them any way you want short of breaking bones or major injuries. Try not to give them concussions; I still need them available if a call comes in." She turned to face the crew, raising her voice. "Bring it in, Strike!"

They gathered around us in a loose semi-circle. I studied them with my arms folded over my chest while Maria gave them their directions. They were all about Steve's size and weight, which meant that even the lightest of them outweighed me by an easy 50 pounds, not counting the weight of their gear.

I smiled, knowing that most of them thought they were getting a cakewalk for their workout today: the deal was they got the rest of their day free as long as they beat me. They didn't know me from Eve, but I didn't have the heart to tell them it wasn't going to be that easy. I may look like an average Agent, but that was it.

My eyes roamed over the group, pausing on an unexpectedly familiar face in the crowd, my tall blond neighbor from across the hall, Jake McCartney. I raised my eyebrow at him and he shook his head slightly, mouthing later. I nodded, indicating Steve, who was standing by the wall with Clint and Natasha. Jake knew we'd been spending time together; we'd run into him more than once in the mornings as we were headed off to the Triskelion. 

Maria finished her instructions and took roll call, handing each man a slip of paper that randomly indicated who was to attack me when. They all went and armed themselves from the two racks Maria had indicated and then most of the group moved out of the way, leaving one man to face me. I shifted into an attack stance, smiling as I twirled my bo, waiting for the whistle to blow. 

When it did, I flashed into motion, my bo coming up to attack the guy I was facing, disarming him swiftly and kicking him back. He hit the wall harder than I intended and went down. A second man came for me and I fell into the routine of hit, kick, punch, flowing smoothly around the gym as I forced my opponents back and disarmed them. More men gradually joined the fight, their numbers ebbing steadily as I knocked out a couple more.

I ducked a punch from one of the larger guys that was meant to rattle my cage, sweeping my leg out to knock the guy off balance and springing out of the way as he fell. I used the force of my spring to kick out at another guy, knocking him back while I stood again, my bo blocking another blow aimed at my head. I brought up my forearm to catch another punch, grabbing his fist and tossing him into the guy behind me. 

At this point, what was left of the guys were surrounding me, hoping to overcome me with their numbers. I laughed, knowing that wasn't going to work as I used their bodies to vault out of the circle. I took down two more before they regrouped, and I had to give them credit - they were well trained and used to working as a unit. At about the halfway point, my bo broke under the force of the blows I'd been blocking and I used them much like I would my short swords. 

I had the upper hand the whole time, so I wasn't concerned when I slipped on the sweat dampened floor and gave them the opening for one of them to actually get their arms around me. I stomped on his foot and gave him an elbow to the ribs. He didn't let go, so I became dead weight and overbalanced him, sliding out of the way and swinging around him. I used my momentum to land on one's back, parkouring off another man and knocking a third out with a well placed kick. 

By this point, there were only four men I hadn't knocked out yet, so I gestured for them to come at me. I flipped over their heads and knocked out two more, catching a third in the ribs hard enough to knock the wind out of him. I faced the last man, who had recovered from being knocked into a wall earlier, only to realize it was Jake. 

"Don't go taking it easy on me now, Evans."

"I won't. Sorry Jake," I said I evaded his hit and punched him in the chest, following with an uppercut that knocked him off his feet, throwing him back a couple feet. I looked around, seeing everyone was down and staying down. I walked over to where Maria stood, surveying the area. "Is Mystique here yet?" I asked her. "Or are we going again once they wake up?"

"I haven't seen her – but then again, I'm not sure who she is today." Maria said, looking up from her notes. "As for your other question, yes, I asked the men for at least two rounds."

"Well, I did tell her to surprise me."

"I'm sure she will," Maria shrugged, smiling slightly. "Good work, Evans."

A motion caught my attention and I turned to face the person approaching. "Speak of the devil," I said, as Steve's twin walked up to us.

"And he shalt appear, or so the saying goes," the not-Steve replied, slightly disappointed we weren't more shocked at her/his appearance.

I grinned widely, "Morning, Mysti. Glad you could finally make it."

"Looks like I missed out on the early show. How'd you know?"

I gave her a look and smiled. "Steve refuses to spar with me yet, but I think the Strike guys could use a little longer break, don't you agree, Maria?"

"Considering that at least two of them are still unconscious, I suppose. Ryan, Martinez – get these two off the floor. Evans is going to go a round with our resident shapeshifter while we're waiting for them to wake up."

"Copy that, Commander," one of them said, glancing between Mystique and Steve.

"I have to admit, Sarah. I'm really enjoying this skin." She flexed Steve's muscles and I laughed at the show she put on. 

"I doubt you'll get used to it, Mysti. I don't think you could handle being such a goody-two-shoes for very long." 

"No, not really. Even his thoughts are 'good' and nice," she said with disdain. "You weren't kidding about the boy scout part, were you?"

"Nope. I want you to bring it, Mysti – really bring it. I need to know how fast and strong he is because at the current rate, this is the only way I'll find out."

"You got it, pooka. No holding back on your end, either. Nothing like that little sham show you put on earlier. 10 minute round – 5 with staves?"

"Deal." I said, glancing over at Steve while the unconscious men were moved over to by the wall. Maria nodded, setting a timer, and I started sinking into my stance, knowing that I couldn't hold anything back now. This wasn't going to be easy, and I honestly didn't know who would win. She may have Steve's memories, but that didn't mean she was as good of a tactician as he was.

 

* * *

Steve's POV

I watched myself walk out onto the workout floor to spar with Sarah in disbelief. "I can't watch this," I ground out between gritted teeth. "It's one thing to watch when I knew it was a controlled exercise; it's another to watch myself deliberately trying to hurt her."

"That's the point; think about it, Cap – if Loki ever got control of you what would happen?" Clint asked, gesturing at himself. "I almost brought down the helicarrier and tried to kill my best friend while I was under his control."

"He's right," Natasha said. "The only one that could stop you without getting killed is the Hulk – maybe Thor if he's on planet. Tony might be able to stop you, but we're not sure. She needs to know how to fight you in a worst case scenario."

"You do have a point," I conceded, watching them shift into fighting stance.

"If Sarah holds out against you for half of the time, will you consider sparring with her on a more regular basis?" Natasha asked, studying my face as I thought that through.

"I'll consider it," I allowed. "Depending on how this match goes."

Maria blew her whistle again and we watched as they smoothly shifted into their attacks. The first thing I noticed was their speed. Sarah's earlier exercise with the Strike teams had been in slow motion compared to now and I suddenly could see just how much she'd been holding back before. I wasn't the only one to realize that, either. The Strike guys were watching with fascination and most of them were looking at her with more respect now. She could have knocked them all out in less than a minute, but instead, she'd left them their dignity.

"Damn," Clint said quietly as we watched their weapons clashing hard and fast. "I mean I know you're fast, but this is something else. You really hold back when you spar with Nat, don't you Cap?"

We watched as they hit each other so hard their bo's broke in half. Keeping both of the parts, they changed attack styles to suit the two shorter weapons, moving so fast they were almost a blur. I couldn't tell who was landing hits, but someone was based off the sound of wood hitting flesh. 

"Yeah, I guess I do," I said, crossing my arms to keep from interfering as a couple hits landed. Sarah was going to be very bruised for as hard as they were hitting each other. "I haven't fought with this kind of intensity since New York."

"She's not letting you take the lead," Natasha murmured, focused on the fighters. "She doesn't think she can beat you." 

It wasn't much longer before the sound of breaking wood had them pausing long enough to discard the now useless weapons, shifting to hand to hand combat. I watched as Sarah landed a firm kick to the torso, pushing Mystique back a couple feet. As soon as she regained her balance, she was back after Sarah, using my strength for a fast punching combination that Sarah almost couldn't block - and she was faster than Natasha.

"I noticed that," I said grimly. "She can't – but that isn't me." We watched as Sarah's attack shifted to more of a boxing style and she landed one to the jaw before dodging a chest punch and kicking at the legs, forcing Mystique back again before continuing her attack. "Sarah's studied my fighting style, hasn't she?"

"Of course," Clint said, wincing as Sarah took a solid hit to the solar plexus followed by a blow to her injured shoulder that sent her to her knees, tucking her arm to the side. "Damn, Cap. Remind me not to ever get on your bad side."

"You've never seen my bad side, Barton," I replied as I exhaled loudly, watching as Sarah struggled to catch her breath but still kept moving, rolling out of the way of the next blow to come up behind Mystique. She kicked at the shapeshifter's lower back following with a double roundhouse kick.

"And I never want to," Clint said as my twin caught Sarah's leg and threw her, slamming her to the ground directly on her injured shoulder.

"How long are they doing this for?" I asked Natasha as she put her hand firmly on my arm, keeping me from intervening. Sarah got up, shifting back into stance, but keeping her right arm close to her body.

"Ten minutes, or until one of them concedes." Natasha replied, checking her watch. "They're almost done."

 

* * *

Sarah's POV

Pain shot down my arm as I tried to raise it for a block. That last fall had somehow reopened the exit wound on my shoulder. I could feel warm blood running down the inside of my suit and soaking my tank top. At this point, I knew we didn't have a lot of time left, so I pushed the pain back, going back on attack. I led with my left, not able to get enough power behind my right.

Every blow I landed on Mystique was like punching a brick wall. I knew Steve was solid; I hadn't realized how solid until now. I started a kicking combo, using my momentum to flip me over him and kick the back of his knees. He rolled forward, going right back to his feet and kicking out. I managed to get back enough that it didn't connect as hard as it could have, but it was still like getting hit by a car. 

I held on and twisted his foot, attempting to throw him off balance and ignoring the sharp pain that shot down my arm as I moved it. I pulled him forward quickly, shoving my knee into his diaphragm and hearing him exhale quickly. I followed with a hard left and an uppercut only to be forced to block Steve's punch, my right arm going numb for a moment from the force of the blow. 

"60 seconds," Maria said from the sidelines and I redoubled my efforts, kicking and punching while sliding around him by drawing on my caporeira background. I wasn't fast enough and he caught me with an elbow to the chest, flinging me back into the wall hard enough to crack the concrete. I landed on my feet as Maria called time, gasping for breath.

Mystique came over and shook my hand. "That was great – you've really improved from the last time we sparred." 

"I'd hope so," I groaned, holding my right arm to my side. "That was a couple years ago."

"Sarah, you're bleeding," Maria said as she came up to us. 

Mystique studied me with a concerned look on Steve's face before she shifted back to the human form she usually used – a girl around my age with longer dirty blond hair and blue eyes. It was disconcerting to watch her morph and I heard noises of surprise coming from the men behind me. 

"I must have reopened it somehow." I looked down to see blood dripping from my fingertips to pool on the floor under my right side.

"Why didn't you say anything?" She reached for the zipper of my catsuit and pulled down the right side of my suit to look at the wound. "We could have done this another day, Evans."

"I didn't want to concede." I said, shrugging my arm out of my sleeve. Luckily, I always wore running capris and a tight tank top under my catsuits because she wasn't going to leave me be until she was satisfied it wasn't serious. The real Steve along with Natasha and Clint came up to us, and I could tell from the expression on Steve's face that he wasn't pleased. 

"Was it finally fleshed over?" Natasha asked as she walked around me. "Because this isn't quite the same spot - I can tell from the scarring."

"Yesterday," I answered. "What do you mean - it isn't quite the same spot? It sure feels like it."

"It's close to where the exit wound was - but it doesn't look like you reopened it," Steve said tightly.

"Rogers, take Evans to go get checked out," Maria said. "She can't afford to lose that much blood yet."

"Yes ma'am," I said as I put my arm back in my sleeve, grimacing at the feel of slippery blood helping the leather slide on easily. I forced my body to walk out the door, my arm held to my side.


	20. Temptation

Steve's POV

I let her walk as far as the door, scooping her up in my arms the moment we were out of sight of the Strike teams and striding quickly down the hallway to the elevator. I glanced down to see that her eyes were closed and her head rested on my shoulder, grateful she wasn't trying to argue with me. I'd managed to not interfere with her fights, so she could give me this, allow me to take care of her. 

"What are you thinking?" she asked as she cracked her eyes open to look at me.

"A lot of things, doll." I said quietly. "Why did I have to watch that?"

"What did you learn from watching?"

"That you really held back against the team. They saw it too." I walked into the Triskelion's hospital, a nurse coming up to us right away and directing me to a room.

"Is Dr Blake here?" Sarah asked as I set her gently on the bed.

"I'll tell him you're here, Agent – ?"

"Evans," I said. "Sarah Evans."

"I'll be right back, Captain Rogers. Sit tight," the nurse said before walking out. 

I refused to look away as she kicked off her boots and unzipped the catsuit, she was so pale. She slowly removed her arms from the sleeves before taking the it the rest of the way off. She hissed as she pulled the now predominately red tank top off, not moving her shoulder more than necessary. 

"Thanks for bringing me down, Steve. You don't have to stay if you don't want to," Sarah said, her eyes meeting mine.

I gave her a look and shook my head. "I'm not leaving you here by yourself. For the record, that was really weird, watching myself fighting you like that, like I wanted to hurt you."

She reached out and touched my face gently with her left hand and smiled. "I know. It's even weirder when you fight yourself, though. We tried that a couple times when I was younger and it always ended in a draw."

I covered her hand with mine, refusing to let her pull away the moment Dr Blake came in the room. I stepped away from her as the doctor approached, pulling on a pair of gloves.

"Good morning, Agent. I thought I told you to take it easy on that shoulder?"

"You did, and I was until this morning. It was fleshed over and everything so I thought I was good."

I watched the doctor's gentle hands touching her, probing the wound.

"It looks like you have something in it, Agent. What were you doing before you came in?"

"Sparring with the Strike teams," I answered before she could. "Both of them."

"Were you using weapons?"

"Wooden staves," she said. "And yes, we broke a couple of them during the fight, but I didn't feel anything pierce my catsuit."

The nurse handed Dr Blake a tweezers and I watched as he dug around, grasping something and easing it out.

"You might have had enough adrenalin going that it's possible you didn't feel it until later. Got it," he said, showing her a decent sized piece of wood that was sharp on both ends. "Were you having difficulty moving your shoulder?"

"I was before," Sarah rotated her arm carefully. "Feels better now."

"How long was that in there, do you suppose?" Dr Blake asked, cleaning up the wound. "I'd like for Dr Banner to scan you to see if there's any more in there."

"I'm not sure – I think when I hit the floor that last time. Pretty sure it was before I hit the wall," she grimaced as the doctor prodded the wound again. "That sounded kinda bad."

"Did you know you were bleeding?"

"I wasn't certain, but I thought I might be."

"Sarah," I said through gritted teeth. "From now on, if you're bleeding, you stop the fight if it's just training, okay?"

"I agree with Captain Rogers," the doctor said. "There's no good reason for you to continue a training exercise if you're injured."

"I won't promise that. If it's not serious, I'm going to keep going," she said stubbornly, frowning at me. I shared a look with the doctor, letting him see just how upset I was at her right now because he understood where I was coming from.

"Captain, would you mind if I spoke to Agent Evans privately?"

"Not at all. Please do, Doctor." I stalked out of the room without a backwards glance, so angry at her deliberate disregard for her well-being that I needed to get away from her for a little bit.

 

* * *

Sarah's POV

"I don't think you'll need stitches, but you do need to take it easy today until it scabs over." Dr Blake said quietly. He sat down on a stool in front of me. "Agent Evans, please be honest with me. Would you let the men under you continue to train if they were bleeding enough to have it running down their body?"

"Probably not, but-"

"No buts, Agent. What kind of message are you sending your team if you keep training when you're injured? Pushing your body further than you should?"

"That I'm not weak," I said firmly.

"Weak? No, you're not weak by any means, Agent. Foolish, yes, but some of that's only because you don't have the wisdom to understand that this isn't helping you in any way. Why won't do what you'd ask your men to do?"

"I see what you're saying."

"Do you? How much blood would you say you've lost today?"

"Maybe a pint."

"On top of the several pints you lost less than a week ago, that means you're in need of a transfusion. I took the liberty of discussing you with Dr Banner after you were in to get your stitches out Friday and he showed me your file. From what I understand, because you lost so much blood, you aren't healing as fast as you normally would, are you?"

"No, I'm not," I reluctantly admitted. If he'd talked to Bruce and seen my file, he knew how healed I should be already.

"In addition to a scan, you will report to lab for a transfusion. I understand they have some of your blood stored there."

"They do," I agreed, standing up.

"One more thing, Agent. The Captain is very taken with you – you being injured doesn't just hurt you, it hurts him as well."

"How do you know that?"

"My wife, Annie, was an Agent."

I immediately caught his use of the past tense. "Was?"

"She was killed in action a little over two years ago. I saw her every time she came home bruised, shot, bleeding, bones broken – the works. Every time, I patched her up, she'd push herself too far – much like yourself. I asked her once why she did it. Do you know what she said?" I shook my head, unable to speak. His eyes met mine and I was taken aback by the sorrow I saw there. He cleared his throat. "She didn't want her men to see her as weak. Because she was a woman, she thought she had to be tougher than all of them all the time. I knew her men, and that wasn't what they thought at all. Not a single one of them."

"I'm sorry, Doctor." I blinked rapidly, willing myself to not cry. 

"Thank you, but it isn't me you need to apologize to, Agent." I looked at him uncomprehendingly. "It's Captain Rogers; you didn't see his face when they brought you in last week. He was pretty torn up about what happened and refused to leave you until he was sure you were going to be all right. I talked to him briefly while we waited for you to wake up."

"And?"

"He said, 'I didn't get a second chance just to watch it slip between my fingers.'" I exhaled quietly, looking away from the doctor. "What you do to yourself doesn't just affect you, Agent."

"I understand, Doctor. I think I needed to hear that."

He nodded, standing up and peeling his gloves off. "Try not to come visit me for a while, okay? But if you ever want to talk, my office door is always open."

"I'll try. I'm going to go get cleaned up before I go to the lab. They tend to get a little excited when I show up looking like this – at least they did at Ops."

"I'll tell them to expect you shortly, Agent, for a scan and a transfusion - however many units Dr Banner says you need."

"Call me Sarah, Doctor. I'd give you a hug but then I'd get blood on you."

"I'll take a raincheck on that, Sarah. Good day."

I picked up my catsuit and bloody shirt before heading out the door. I didn't want to put it back on, hating the feel of stiff, blood-soaked cloth on my skin. Thankfully, the elevator was empty as I headed up to the 41st floor so I didn't have to make small talk with anyone.

* * *  
Steve's POV

I sincerely hoped the doctor was able to talk some sense into Sarah, because I couldn't seem to get through to her what I felt when I watched her get injured and push herself to the limit. I wasn't sure if it was because of her youth, because she was just that stubborn, or some combination of both. 

My phone buzzed just before I walked into the gym. I pulled it out to see a text from Sarah.

Sarah: Sorry I was stupid. XO

I smiled to myself and shook my head as the next message came through. 

Sarah: I have to get scanned and get a transfusion, so u can take Nat tonight if u want.

She was giving me an out if I was still angry with her, but I didn't want an out – I wanted her. I leaned against the wall to reply before she made plans for me instead.  
Me: You aren't getting out of our date that easily, doll. Wear something nice.

Sarah: Like a dress?

Me: You look nice in dresses, doll. You look nice in everything.

Sarah: Even right now? 

I got a picture with this one of her in her blood streaked capris and sports bra, sitting on a hospital bed. I think you need to get your eyes checked.

Me: Even right now. 

Now that I knew she was going to be fine, I could breathe again. 

Me: See you at 1600. I've got some work to do yet.

Sarah: K

I tucked my phone away and walked into the gym. Everyone was still there since I hadn't been gone for more than ten minutes.

"How's Evans?" Maria asked, turning to me as I reached her.

"She's fine now. Somehow she got a chunk of wood in her from one of the broken staves in her shoulder."

"That's surprising. It shouldn't have been able to get through her suit." Natasha said, having heard what I'd said.

"She wasn't wearing the reinforced one, was she?" Maria sighed. "She would have thought that was an unfair advantage over the Strike teams and she wasn't planning on sparring with Mystique this morning either."

"Bingo," I said. "That's exactly it. She's had some horrible luck recently."

"Where is she now?" Clint asked. "Everyone's finally up and moving again."

"Getting a scan and a transfusion. Doc said she's lost too much blood the past week, sent her down to Bruce for a while. The rest of the guys okay?"

"Yeah. I'm going to have Natasha work with them for a while, so would you take Mystique up to see Fury?"

"Sure. If you don't need me after that, I'll be in the conference room working on prep for the next mission." Maria nodded and turned back to the crew. I gestured to the shapeshifter and we headed for the door.

"She really does care for you, you know," Mystique said as I held the door for her.

"How do you know that?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

She morphed into Sarah right before my eyes. "I know what she thinks, how she feels. She's afraid you only want to be with her because she looks like Peggy, and she wouldn't be totally wrong now, would she Captain?" 

"It's what drew me to her initially," I conceded. "But if you know that, then you also know that isn't the only reason I like her."

"Mhh, ah yes, better and better, the reasons you give. The best friend that so strongly resembles your former best friend, Bucky." She shifted again, this time into Bucky – the way he was before the war. My heart pounded as I stared at him, shaking my head to break eye contact with the shapeshifter.

"Stop that, Mystique. Bucky's gone and he's not coming back."

"You're sure about that?" A shiver ran down my spine as Jace's voice came out. I wasn't expecting that. "They defrosted you just fine after all. Who's to say he isn't a popsicle somewhere in the Alps? That river never truly thaws, you know."

I saw red as I turned to her, slamming her into a wall with one hand on her throat. "Bucky's gone, so find another form fast, shapeshifter – or I won't be responsible for my actions."

She morphed back into the blond woman she'd been earlier, a grin on her lips. "Temper, temper, Captain; although you might want to let me go before someone gets the wrong idea about us." Her eyes cut to the bystanders who were watching us with interest. "I certainly wouldn't mind another kiss, Steve. We were so rudely interrupted last night."

She brought her hands up to caress me and I roughly pushed away from her, unwilling to have her touching me like that. I continued striding down the hallway, neither knowing or caring if she was following me anymore.

"I seem to have hit a nerve." She said when she caught up to me. "You're even more handsome when you're angry. Those blue eyes – mhmm- mm- mm!"

"Leave me alone. I have a girlfriend and I'm not interested in you."

"Liar. You're not even dating her yet."

I stopped outside Fury's office and knocked on the door, not waiting for him to tell me to enter before opening the door. He looked up at me with an amused expression on his face, which didn't help my mood any.

"Director Fury, Mystique is here to see you." I stood aside to let her enter, scowling when she chose to brush up against me as she passed. I left without another word, at the last second remembering not to slam the door, shutting it loudly instead.

* * 

I walked into Maria's office to discuss our plans for tomorrow, only to be surprised to see that Sarah was already back from her mission with Mystique and arguing with someone over the phone, still in her dirt-streaked fatigues. She gave me a warm smile as soon as she noticed me and continued talking for another minute before handing the phone back to Maria.

"Hey Steve! I'd hug you but I'm filthy. We just got back." 

"It's good to have you back, Sarah," I said with a smile. "I didn't think I'd get to see you before I leave tomorrow." I paused before asking quietly, "You didn't bring her back with you, did you?"

Sarah snorted and tried not to laugh. She knew I didn't particularly care for the troublesome shapeshifter. "No, she's on her way back to the School."

"Good. Do I need to have you prove you're really you?"

She threw me an amused glance and rolled her eyes. "Ha, ha. Anyways, I wouldn't have gotten home today originally, but we lucked out and found the tunnel faster than we thought we would."

"That's good. Everyone all right?"

"Mikey wrenched his ankle when he fell through the ceiling finding the tunnel – I'm sure he'll tell you the whole story in detail - and Jake got shot in the arm. I got the bullet out and wrapped it in the Quinjet on our way back; I sent him to check in with Dr Blake."

"It'll give Kate a reason to fuss over him," I teased, making her laugh.

She pretended to hit my arm. "Are you trying to get Kate in more trouble? You know Jake's girlfriend doesn't like Kate much."

"Jake's girlfriend doesn't like anyone much – except Jake," I pointed out. I certainly didn't like her, but he already knew that.

"And you – she hits on you shamelessly when he's not around; do I need to be worried?"

"She's not my type," I said with a grin. "There's this little brunette on my floor that's a real looker. Have you seen her?" Sarah laughed quietly and rested her hand on my arm.

"I'm going to go get cleaned up and head home."

I touched her face lightly. "I'll be there shortly. I'm not quite done for the day yet."

 

* * 

I knew I should really be sleeping, but I didn't want to miss out on any of my limited time with Sarah. We were both gone a lot lately, so I didn't get to spend as much time with her as I'd like to. She'd fallen asleep halfway through the movie and I'd shifted her so that she was laying on my chest, soaking in my body heat like a contented kitten. I stroked her long, dark hair that she'd left loose at my request, running my fingers through the silky strands and spreading it out over her back and my arm.

Sarah always looked so peaceful when she slept. I never got tired of watching her sleep, her perfectly formed lips were slightly parted and her long eyelashes brushed her tanned cheeks. I'd missed so many little things about her while she'd been gone, like her unique scent. It was a pleasant combination of her shampoo - stronger at the moment due to her slightly damp locks - her laundry soap mingled with her perfume.

She started to stir as the movie ended and I looked down to see her golden brown eyes flutter open. She smiled slightly when her eyes focused on me.

"Ready to go to bed?"

"Mmmhmm." She closed her eyes again and brought a hand up to touch my face but didn't move to stand up. I didn't think she was really awake, though. 

"Do you want me to carry you?" I asked when her I felt her go limp again, confirming my theory.

"Mmmhmm," she murmured, not even opening her eyes this time.

I chuckled, sitting up and shifting her so I could carry her. She cracked her eyes open briefly, letting me know she was semi-awake.

"You need to eat more, doll. There's nothing to you," I teased, knowing it would get a response from her. Sure enough, her eyes shot open and narrowed at me.

"Wonderboy, are you for real? You can lift thousands of pounds, of course my 135 pounds doesn't seem like much."

I snorted at the Hercules reference. "Does that make you Meg?" I tossed her on the bed and she bounced right up, winding her arms around my neck and kissing me to keep me from talking. 

"Call me nutmeg and I'll hurt you," she growled.

"Meg, Meg, Meg, my little nutmeg," I said with a smile, unable to resist riling her up. I found myself pinned to the bed a moment later, blinking in astonishment.

"Let's see if Wonderboy is ticklish," she said, a wicked grin on her face as her hands ran over my body, her fingernails lightly scratching my skin. My muscles shuddered unexpectedly when she scraped my sides and her smile widened as she repeated the motion again to the same effect. "You are!" she gasped, reaching for the hem of my shirt to tug it up and off me, trapping my hands in it as she kissed me deeply. 

I studied her as she sat back on me, straddling my hips and touching my torso so lightly I almost couldn't feel her. I decided to play along for now; I could easily free myself, but I was curious as to what she would do next. A loose feather from my down comforter caught her attention and she picked it up, twirling it between her fingers before tracing it over my skin. I watched her eyes as she focused on me, feeling my skin ripple and goose-bump beneath her fingers. She leaned forward and blew on my skin and I jumped at the unfamiliar sensation, making her giggle.

"Interesting," she said, and I tensed my muscles as she pursed her lips to do it again. It was just as intense the second time, my skin skittering under her ministrations. She tipped her head forward, letting her hair fall onto my skin. I sucked in a breath and tried to lock my muscles as I realized what she was doing, her hair moving across my torso and teasing my skin.

She felt me tense and leaned forward to kiss me. "I'll stop if it's too much for you; just say the word, okay?"

I nodded, freeing one hand to stroke her face lightly. "It's all right for now. I'm not used to being touched like that."

If anything, her smile widened. "I find it hard to resist touching you."

"I've noticed," I grinned. "And I'm not complaining. Do I get to touch you like this as well?"

"When I'm done with you, maybe." She kissed my palm and pushed my arm back up over my head. "Leave that there for now. Can I blindfold you?"

"I trust you," I said, nodding. She pulled off her t-shirt and tied it over my eyes. With my sight gone, all of my other senses were ratcheted up a notch. I felt her warmth leave me and then she was tugging off my socks, leaving me in just my shorts. If I wasn't turned on before, I certainly was now and I felt myself hardening.

It was almost sensory overload for me as I felt her climb back on the bed, her smooth limbs touching mine. She touched me firmly first, sliding her hands over my torso and down my legs before reversing. The next time was lighter but somehow just as intense. It was the third time she did it, so lightly – she was barely touching me – but somehow that was almost overpowering to me and I had to force myself to leave my hands over my head. Her lips followed next, her hair tickling me as she kissed, licked and nipped her way down my torso. My hip bones were particularly sensitive, and it didn't help that I was convinced she was sprawled between my legs, her hair falling everywhere on my thighs.

I was breathing shallowly and my cock was aching fiercely by the time she moved back up, her body rubbing over it and teasing it as she laid on me, the feel of her skin against mine was incredible. She kissed me again, her tongue stroking mine as she ran her hands over my arms, bringing one down and resting it on her leg. She brought the other one down as well, her fingers trailing lightly over my skin. I needed to touch her, so I brought my hand up her leg, lightly squeezing her pert ass before moving my hand to her small waist, my thumb tracing circles over her hipbone.

She tugged on my arm, indicating she wanted me to sit up. The minute I did, she climbed in my lap, her body pressing closer to me. She ran her hands over my back, scraping the skin lightly with her fingernails until it felt like my whole body was on fire and I couldn't take any more.

I put my arms around her, crushing her to my chest as I kissed her and taking the blindfold off. I kept control of the kiss, brushing her hair back to kiss down her neck, nipping the sensitive spot on her collar bone before capturing her lips again. She wound her legs around my waist, trapping my cock between us and drawing a groan from me as she sucked on my tongue, wearing away what little control I thought I had as my mind instantly leapt to the thought of her sucking on something else.

I took a deep breath and immediately slowed the kiss down, making it sweeter and less needy because I wasn't ready for what would come next if we didn't stop now, even as my body yearned for release.

"Wow," she said breathlessly, resting her forehead on mine. "I didn't intend to let it get that heated."

"Wow is right," I said roughly, my voice deeper than before. I caressed her face.


	21. Celebration

Wed July 4th 2012  
Sarah's POV

I woke up to the bright morning sunshine coming into the window. It was Independence Day, my favorite summer holiday, so everything was shut down for the holiday and we had the day off. My head was pillowed by Steve's chest. Surprisingly, he was still asleep, so I took a moment to just look at him. He was always handsome, but when he was sleeping peacefully, he looked almost angelic. I carefully slid out of his arms and reached for my phone to take a picture of him. It was pretty rare that I was awake before he was. I grinned and snapped a couple pics before scrolling through my messages.

There were a couple that I sent off replies to before setting the alarm on my phone for 9 and putting it back on the nightstand. We had quite a while before we needed to get up, so I went to the bathroom and brushed my teeth before coming back to the bed and worming my way back into his arms. He was pretty used to me moving around in my sleep by now, so he didn't even wake up as I got back into my spot. 

I had already asked Steve if there was anything special he wanted to do, but he's only said he wanted to spend the day with me. I warned him that he might regret that and planned a full week for us. Today was Wednesday, so we were going to go catch the National Independence Day Parade and then go grill out at Tony's and screw around with his water toys. Tony said he had a private beach and waterfront access at his DC house that we were all invited to use, so the team, Rhodey, Pepper and Maria were meeting us there. None of the others had wanted to go to the parade.

Today was also Steve's birthday, so we were planning a surprise party for him later. My parents, Jace and Chloe were driving up this afternoon to meet us at Tony's DC house. He was taking care of the food and had a caterer lined up. I had been extra sneaky this week trying to get everything done with out him noticing. I had bought and wrapped his present last week when he was out of town and left it at Tony's. Natasha had taken it upon herself to arrange for a birthday cake. 

I smiled to myself as I remembered that conversation.

"Go easy on the candles this time, Nat. I heard about the last cake you got him."

She had laughed and shook her head. "You're dreaming. It's go big or go home!" 

Tony had shrugged, unconcerned at a repeat of the first cake – probably because he found it hilarious. "I'll have DUMM-E on standby with a fire extinguisher just in case. It's his favorite job."

I had given up at that point and went to go find Maria. After pestering her for a couple days, she finally agreed to come. I also convinced her that since she had known Steve longer, she was in charge of the guest list. I told her I expected to see her for lunch and drinks at Tony's beach and Natasha said she'd make sure Maria showed. Between them, they were going to make sure that any of Steve's friends that I didn't know were coming.

I felt Steve stir, so I looked up at him to see his cobalt eyes watching me. He had a small smile on his face as he reached over to run his fingers over my cheek. "Morning. I must have been more tired than I thought."

"That's what happens when you don't come to bed until well after midnight. I fell asleep waiting for you." I tried to climb up on him, but he resisted like he usually did and rolled on his side to face me. I hadn't been able to convince him to take our relationship further than kissing and mild petting. He had become quite adroit at evading my attempts to take the next step and move past second base. We may spend almost every night together, but we really only just slept, nothing more. 

I sighed, which made him smile. He leaned over and kissed me deeply, holding my hands over my head in one of his hands so I couldn't run them over his body like I usually did. His other hand rested on my hip and slowly worked up my back. My alarm went off then, so he let me go so I could turn it off. I turned back to him and he was laying with his arms under his head, watching me.

"So what do you have planned for today, beautiful?"

"A parade, grilling out and water sports. Fireworks later when it gets dark."

"Sounds like a busy day. Not sure I know what grilling out means or what water sports involve, though."

I laughed at his expression. "I suppose people didn't char their food recreationally back then. It's the all-American summer pastime. You're going to love the water sports. I love tubing and skiing."

"People ski on water? I thought skis were only for snow?"

"Now you have to try it! I'm filming it, just so you know."

"Are you going to show me how it's done first?"

"Of course! You'd have to tie me up to keep me off them."

"I could think of better reasons for tying people up."

"I think we should compare lists." I leaned over him and kissed him again before trying to tickle him on his sides. Laughing, I evaded his hands and jumped out of bed.

"If you want breakfast before the parade, get your butt out of bed, Rogers."

"I like it when you get bossy," he said with a smirk, winking at me.

We made our way to the kitchen and I got out the milk and eggs to make french toast since I had a loaf of bread that had gotten pretty dry. Steve turned on the stove and pulled out a couple frying pans. I had learned that he liked to cook, he had just needed to be taught how to run his appliances. I whisked the milk and eggs and rummaged in the cupboard until I found the cinnamon and vanilla. I added both liberally and gave the batter bowl to Steve. While he started the french toast cooking, I cracked eggs into another bowl and sprinkled them with salt, pepper and cajun. I whisked them until they were well mixed and poured them into the other heated pan. I set out another spatula for him and took the dirty dishes over to the sink to start washing them while Steve finished cooking breakfast. 

After eating, I went to get in the shower and Steve went back to his place to get changed. I found my new favorite Captain America tank top and put on some cutoff jean shorts. I packed my swimsuit and a change of clothes for the party later in a small backpack. It was a beautiful day, so we were taking Steve's bike. I locked up, grabbing my keys, wallet, phone and sunglasses and walked over to Steve's apartment, letting myself in. He had left his trunks and a change of clothes on the table, so I put them in my bag. 

"Steve – are you ready to go?" I called, not sure where in the apartment he was since I couldn't see him right then. I heard him answer from the bathroom.

"Yeah, just looking for a shirt."

"A specific one or just in general? There's still a load in the dryer that I never took out last night before bed." 

"Specific. It's probably in there, then because it's not in here." 

I walked over to the dryer and opened it, emptying the load and taking it into the bedroom so he could find what he was looking for. I dumped the basket on the bed and he came out of the bathroom.

"There it is. Thanks, doll." He leaned down and grabbed a white shirt before giving me a kiss. He pulled on his shirt and I laughed. It was the t-shirt that Jace and I had found at the museum that matched this years Barnes family reunion tank top. We had determined that his arms on display would cause a riot, so t-shirt it was.

"I need a picture of us before I manage to spill something on my shirt again." I pulled out my phone and made him pose with me for a picture. "See, it turned out great."

"It has you in it, of course it's great." He smiled and I snapped a quick one of him alone.

"Let's go if we're going to get a good spot. I can't believe you've never been to a parade before." I grabbed my backpack and we headed out the door.

"Never saw the point of going to one when I was a kid and later on I had better things to do than sit out in the sun and watch people walk by."

We found a good spot to watch from and got to watch for a while until I realized that once people started to recognize Steve, he was a bigger draw than the parade. The reporters were out, so I know our picture was being taken. I was glad I had made an effort to look cute today. We left not very far into the parade so that we wouldn't be the focus of attention. The crowd had grown, so he kept his arm around me and steered me back to his bike.

"Sorry, Steve. I didn't realize that was going to happen."

"You didn't know, Sarah," he said, giving me a kiss as we reached his bike. "It's just something I'll never get used to."

A photographer came up to us then and asked if he could take a couple photos of us on Steve's bike. He glanced back at me, letting me choose.

"Sure, but will you take one for me with my phone first?" I handed him my phone and put my pack on the ground on the other side of the bike.

"Sure thing. What's your name, miss?"

"Sarah with an 'h'."

"What's your last name?"

I smiled and shook my head. "That's for me to know and you to find out."

He took it better than I thought he would and grinned. "Mysterious. Makes selling papers easier. All right, say cheese kids."

We smiled and posed as he took my picture first before snapping a couple of his own. He handed back my phone and thanked us. I put on my pack and Steve started the bike and drove us to Tony's. It was a great morning for a drive, not too hot or windy.

* *

We pulled into Tony's drive and parked the bike, heading up the steps to the house. Everyone else was there already, lounging on the back lawn and drinking. I went over to Tony first and gave him a hug while Steve stopped to talk to Natasha and Clint.

"Hey, Tony! We're here."

He kissed my cheek and smiled. "Hi kitten, thought you weren't coming until later?"

"Is that what you've settled on for the moment? Kitten?" I laughed as he grinned. "Why kitten?"

"You don't like it? I can find something else, okay pumpkin?"

I grimaced. "I'll answer to kitten if you're going to move on to food names, okay Papi?"

"Papi?" Tony asked, raising an eyebrow imperiously.

"It's what my friends and I call each others parents. We used to spend so much time at each others houses that their parents have become like my own as well."

"I like it. So did you go the parade then?"

"I didn't think through my plan to take Captain America to an Independence Day parade. We left when people were starting to focus on us instead of the parade."

"Sorry, kid. That's just how the cookie crumbles. You get used to that kind of thing after a while. So I should expect to see your pictures in the tabloids again next week?"

I sighed. "Probably." I thought back to the conversation we'd had right after I'd found out he was my biological father.

-=-=-= Flashback

"So, Tony, what should I call you? 

"I think it depends on what we decide about letting the public know about you." He leaned back in his chair and studied me for a moment. "The moment the press finds out, you will never have a minute to yourself again. Your face will be on the cover of every magazine and every newspaper for the next six months as people analyze your every move. Top that off with your relationship with Steve and you're the hottest thing since sliced bread."

"I was hoping that wasn't going to be the case because that would mean the end of me being a field agent. That much publicity would make it impossible for me to work effectively with the team. I like going under cover. It's exciting; it's an adrenaline rush – and I'm really good at it."

"Then we wait until you're ready. Until then, you just keep calling me Tony. Pepper knows, the team knows, your parents know, as do Maria and Fury. Beyond that, I don't see that we need to inform the general public before you turn 21."

"Is that going to blow up in our faces when they learn that?"

"They might try, but any statement made will mention the contract that we all signed stating that there was to be no early disclosure to you. It's filed with the courts and signed by the judge who endorsed the adoption. Nothing anyone could do about it without getting slapped with a hefty lawsuit with any and all charges my teams of lawyers could come up with."

"Are you okay with waiting to make it all official? I wouldn't mind spending some time with you to get to know you better, not just your public persona or the Shield Stark."

"I'd like that, Sarah. If you can make the time for it, I'd also like you to spend some time with Pepper learning about Stark Industries and how it operates. It's entirely likely you'll inherit it someday."

"You and Pepper could still have other kids. They would definitely be more suited to doing that kind of stuff with a mom like Pepper."

"I'm almost 40, Sarah, and we've been trying since I got back from Afghanistan, but it just hasn't happened."

-=-=-End flashback

Pepper came up just then with drinks for the three of us. 

"Hey Pepper. Good to see you." I said as I took mine.

"Glad you're here, Sarah. How was the parade?"

"Good, the little bit we got to watch before Steve became more interesting than the parade."

"Oh. You get used to it." She smiled sympathetically.

"That's what Tony said. This is still a little surreal to me, you know. It's like I found myself starring in a Nickolas Sparks novel."

Pepper laughed and Tony snorted, taking a sip of his drink. "I was thinking John Greene. He's a little more original, at least."

I thought about that and nodded. I liked John Greene too. "I wouldn't mind being in a Brad Thor novel. That's much more up my alley – espionage, action, saving the good guys and taking out the bad guys."

"I think I should probably read some of his work before I agree with that statement," Tony said.

"If you like action, he writes well." My phone buzzed and I glanced at it. "Jace says they'll be here in 10 minutes. Thanks for letting them come."

Tony smiled. "I don't mind hosting holidays. Besides, how else am I going to meet your friends."

"True. So who's grilling?"

"Bruce. He says he likes pretending to be normal. I have extra meat in the fridge if it all turns into charcoal."

"Good show of faith, Tony. You didn't tell him that, did you?" said Pepper, smacking him on the arm. I laughed at Tony's expression - he probably did say that to Bruce, knowing him.

 

* * *

Steve's POV

"You and Tony still not speaking, Steve?" asked Natasha, smirking as she took a sip of her vodka and studying me for a minute.

"Something like that. He's not my biggest fan at the moment." I took the chair next to Clint and he poured me a drink.

"Well, she is his only daughter and he did just get her back in his life." Clint said, leaning back in his chair so he could look at me. "How was the parade? Sufficiently patriotic?"

I laughed. "What little of it we did see. People were starting to notice I was there and were wanting pictures and autographs, so we left; didn't see a point in staying if we were only going to be a disruption." I took a sip of my drink. "I think Sarah was a little disappointed, but it was really crowded, so I was ready to go." They nodded, understanding my sentiment on crowds. Since New York, we didn't exactly blend in anymore.

"They get Sarah's name yet?" asked Nat.

"She gave them her first name." I admitted, shaking my head. "They've been remarkably persistent in trying to figure out who she is. I guess she got tired of the pseudonyms they were coming up with for her."

"You have to admit they were getting pretty creative considering they've been trying to learn her identity since you were seen together at the park a month ago. Vivacious Vivette is my favorite, though," she laughed. Natasha hit Clint and he pulled out his wallet and gave her $20.

"It hasn't even been that long. I've only known her for three weeks now. What is that for?"

"I bet Nat that it would take them at least a month to learn even her first name." Clint said with a grimace and Natasha smirked.

"So who's ahead at the moment? You two have made more bets on Sarah than anything else."

"Believe it or not, I am," said Clint. "I hadn't lost for a week. There goes my streak."

"So do you guys know about these water sports Sarah was telling me about earlier?"

"Yeah, Tony has a couple jet ski's and a skiboat waiting down by the water." replied Natasha. "You gonna give it a try?"

"Sure, why not. She said she'd teach me."

"So getting this on film!" Natasha said, chuckling.

I shook my head. "That's what she said, too. You really think I'm not going to be able to do it?"

"Hard saying. It takes a little practice to get it down," said Clint. "I'm looking forward to seeing how fast I can dump Nat from the tube."

"Bring it, Barton. I can take anything you throw at me." She smiled mischievously at him and I raised my hands to lock them behind my head. I always found their banter amusing.

"So what is 'grilling out'? I'm assuming it's a kind of cooking?"

Nat grinned and gestured to Clint for him to explain. He took a drink before pointing at Bruce, who was standing in front of some kind of metal outdoor fireplace. "It's an American summer pastime. We drink beer and roast meat over flames." My expression must have still been confused, because he continued elaborating. "Most people just cook hot dogs and hamburgers - I'm hoping you know what they are?" I rolled my eyes and nodded. "Bruce is making ribs today too, I guess. We can go over if you want to check it out."

"Sure. It looks interesting. Does everyone do this?"

"For summer holidays, yeah, pretty much. Let's go see how long it'll be before we eat." Clint and I got up to go over to the smoking grill and Nat leaned back to put her feet on the table. I shook my head at her, but she only grinned and took a drink of her vodka.

 

* * *

Sarah's POV

I saw the guys head over to congregate around the fire. I saw Natasha sitting by herself, so I stopped next to her on my way to the front. I pushed her feet off the table with a smirk. "You know better, Nat - we eat on that table! Who knows what you've got on your feet!"

"Flipflops and nail polish. See?" She brought her foot up to my face, wiggling her toes.

"Nice. I like that shade of pink." I pushed her foot back down. "My parents, Jace and Chloe are going to be here in a few minutes. When's Maria coming?"

"Any time now. Is Kate coming?"

"Not until later, I asked, but she said Steve didn't know she worked at Shield and she wanted to keep it that way. I told her I needed her for the water wars or we wouldn't have enough girls. Sam Wilson – my friend that works at the VA – said he'd be by for them so we can have a rematch." 

"Water wars?"

"Jet skis screwing around until there's only one winner. It's fun – right up your alley. Why doesn't she want Steve to know she works at Shield?"

"Fury assigned her to keep a watch on him when he first moved in. She's a Special Agent, so she's good at what she does."

"Okay. I wondered why she never came up to the 41st floor."

"Most people aren't allowed up there. She is, but she'll only come up if Steve's not there. So if you're there, he probably is too."

"Gotcha," I said, finally understanding. "So what kind of cake did you get?"

"A big one. I had to fit a lot of candles on it."

"Nat!"

"It's a tradition. Besides I had one too many on the one I gave him in May. He's 94 now."

"And you are what - 83? When's your birthday?"

"Yep, I guess. I don't know. I was orphaned as a baby, so I couldn't tell you."

"Well, I guess that means you get to pick your own, then." My phone buzzed and I glanced at it, seeing that Jace said they were here. "Be right back," I said to Natasha as walked up to the house, cutting through to get to the front drive. My parent's car was just pulling in. I waved and my dad pulled up next to Steve's bike. I ran down to meet them.

"Hi Mom, Dad. You made it!" I gave both of them hugs as I waited for Jace and Chloe to get out.

"Hi honey. I wasn't sure I had the right place, but Jace said this was it."

"It sure is. Steve's out back with the rest of the team."

"So does he know we're coming?"

"Maybe – I don't remember if I told him or not. The birthday party is a surprise, though." I looked over at Jace and Chloe and laughed. They were wearing the same tank top I was.

"Nice!" I said as I pulled them in for a hug. "Steve's wearing his, too."

"Willingly or did you make him?" Chloe asked, a grin spreading across her face.

"He did it all on his own, but I had mine on first. Thanks for coming, guys. Everyone's in the back. I'll take you there now if you want to grab your bags. Tony had the jet ski's and boat brought out for us to use later."

"Sweet!" Jace exclaimed. "Do I get to drive the boat?"

"You get to help me teach Steve how to ski."

They grabbed their bags out of the trunk and I led them into the house and gave them a moment to adjust before introducing them to Jarvis.

"Jarvis, these are my parents, Betty and Archie Evans. Mom, Dad, say hello to Jarvis. He's Tony's right hand man."

"Hello, Jarvis," my parents said, looking around. Jarvis' voice came out of the overhead speakers, giving them a start. 

A pleasure to meet you, Mr and Mrs Evans. I've heard a lot about you. Mr Stark had been expecting you.

My parents gave me a wide-eyed look and I gestured to my friends. "J- these are my best friends, Chloe Turner and Jace Barnes."

"This is so cool. Hi Jarvis," said Jace with a grin.

"Hello," squeaked out Chloe, her eyes huge.

Hello Ms Turner, Mr Barnes.

"We're heading outside, after I show them where to put their bags. Which rooms are they supposed to use?"

Mr Stark had the rooms on the first floor readied for everyone. The ones closest to the stairs, perhaps?

"Sounds good. What time are we eating at?"

Dr Banner says that he would have the meat ready in about 15 minutes.

I gestured to the stairs and led them up, waiting in the hall for them until they were situated before taking them outside. I could tell they were all a little overwhelmed, like I had been the first time I had come here. After all, how often did you meet an AI and a multi-billionaire?

"Tony, Pepper, these are my parents, Betty and Archie Evans. Mom, Dad. Tony Stark and Pepper Potts."

They all shook hands and I put my arms around my friend's waists. "And this is Chloe Turner and Jace Barnes, the friends I told you about."

Chloe was still in awe of meeting Iron Man. I kept my arm around her in case she decided to faint. It wouldn't have been the first time she'd gotten overexcited at meeting someone famous. Jace stepped forward to shake Tony's and Pepper's hands, taking it all in stride with a crooked grin on his face. I left my parents talking to Tony and took Jace and Chloe over to meet the rest of the team. The guys had come back to the table and were sitting there talking to Natasha.

* * *

Steve's POV

I figured Sarah's parents must have gotten here when she disappeared. I hadn't known her friends were coming with, so that was a pleasant surprise. Chloe was so excited to be here I was amazed she wasn't hyperventilating. I intended to shake her hand, but she hugged me instead. I returned it, careful to not squeeze her too hard. I didn't have to be as careful with Sarah as I did others. "I didn't know you guys were coming up today." I let go of Chloe and she gave me a huge grin after seeing my shirt, which matched her and Jace's as well.

"Nice shirt, big guy," she patted my arm as I let go of her. "We always get together for the holidays, Steve. That's what they're for!" 

I snorted and Sarah drew her away to introduce her to the rest of the team. I turned to Jace with a grin. "It's great to see you again, Jace." I said as I clasped hands with him, clapping him on the back. Jace gave me a mischievous smile that was familiar to me. Bucky used to give me that same grin before saying something outlandish.

"I take it you didn't know we were coming? You take surprises pretty well for an old guy."

"Hah – you've met Sarah, I don't need to explain any further than that. I knew Sarah's parents were coming because she wanted them to meet Tony, but she didn't say anything about you guys."

"Nice shirt, Steve."

"You too. Sarah's doing?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Mine. We always get matching Cap shirts for every 4th. My whole family is weird like that. We get to skip the family reunion this year, though, since everyone was there for my graduation a month ago. Wanna come to the next family holiday? The twins are going to be unbearable when they find out I got to hang out with you and they didn't." 

"When's that?"

"Thanksgiving. We usually go on a short trip for Labor Day, but I'm pretty sure I'll have to miss out this year."

"I'll talk to Sarah, but I'm sure that it probably isn't a problem."

"She's usually there too for part of the day, along with her folks if her mom isn't working. She doesn't have any other family nearby."

"I see. I had wondered, but I assumed that was the case since she never talks about them. Ready to meet the rest of my team?" We turned to

"Am I ever! I hear you're going to learn how to water ski today." The crooked grin was back and I laughed. I missed Bucky like crazy today of all days, but it helped, having Jace and Sarah here. 

I introduced Jace to everyone else. Chloe had decided that Bruce was the safest one to sit next to because she was perched next to him chattering his ear off, so I left him for last. Natasha gave Jace a long enigmatic look, but greeted him politely. Clint was his normal easygoing self. Bruce was intrigued, having already known of Jace's physical similarity to Bucky. I had talked to him about it when I had gotten back from Sarah's parent's house after that weekend.

Sarah had went back over to her parents and they were all coming this way now.

"The caterer is done setting up the rest of the food in the kitchen to keep it cooler, so lets get our plates and bring them out here to eat. Bruce, is the meat ready to come off the grill?"

"Yes. I just need something to put it on."

"Excellent. Mario is sending someone to take care of it right now. Let's eat."


	22. Water Wars

Sarah's POV

As we headed into the house my mom put her hand on my arm. "Oh! I forgot the cookies in the car, Sarah. I made them last night."

"Chocolate chip or devils' food?"

"Both. I know I didn't need to make anything, but I was sending some over to the Barnes' since the twins were asking if you were coming home for the holiday."

"I thought they weren't having the reunion this year since everyone was there for graduation?"

"They aren't, but I always make cookies for the 4th."

"I'm glad you did. I'm surprised they made it here with Jace in the car."

"I had your father guarding them. I know better than to leave food near Jace if I want it to make it there."

I laughed and ran out to the car to go get them as everyone else followed Tony. They were sitting on the dash, so they were perfectly warm already since it was already in the 90's. It was supposed to get over 100 today, so I was looking forward to getting in the water later.

I shut the car door and looked over to see Maria Hill pulling into the driveway. I waved and waited for her to park. "Hey Maria, you're just in time to eat. Food just came off the grill."

"Great, I'm starving. Whose car is that?"

"My parents'. My friends Chloe and Jace came down with them for the day. Are you going to ski with us later?"

"We'll see. I brought my suit just in case." She grabbed her bag from the back seat and we turned to walk into the house.

"Is Fury coming?"

"No, grilling out is too normal for him. He said he was busy today." Maria went upstairs to drop her bag off. I went into the side kitchen to put the cookies out. Mario, Tony's chef, was directing the army of caterers. He saw me come in and came over to see what I was up to. I gave him a quick hug as he said hello.

"Mario, you have to try these. My mom made them," I said in Italian as I grabbed a platter out of the cupboard and started filling it.

"What is this, little one?"

"Chocolate chip cookies to die for and Devil's food cookies. They're my favorite."

"Then I will sample one of each so I may make them for you in the future."

"Thanks, Mario. You're the best. I'm hiding some of these for later, by the way."

He laughed as he took a small one of each kind. "Would you like for me to put them in a safe place?"

"Please. Jarvis can tell me where they are later." I took the platter and brought it out to set it with the rest of the food. Jace exclaimed happily, "I knew I wasn't imagining things. I could have sworn I could smell them in the car earlier."

"You did. Mom knows better than to trust you around them, Jace." I made my way around and filled my plate up, grabbing a cold beer from the fridge, handing one to Jace. He walked out with me and we sat at the long table. I put him next to Natasha, just to see how he'd react and sat next to Bruce. Chloe was chattering at Clint now, who was listening to her with a smile. 

'This one is terrified of Nat. Won't go near her,' He signed. I took a drink of my beer to hide my smile.

'What did she do?' I replied. 'I wasn't gone long enough for her to get into trouble.' 

'Nothing yet, just gave her that look.'

I glared at Nat, who shrugged and smiled. 'This one isn't. I like him.'

Jace chuckled and said to her, "You're not so bad yourself, Agent Romanoff." Clint and I burst into laughter and Tony smiled as he looked up.

"I suppose what she knows, you know as well?" Natasha asked him, smiling wryly. 

"Not as well, just enough to get by."

Steve looked confused, not having followed the exchange, so I leaned over and whispered what had happened as the conversation continued. He chuckled as well, glancing at Natasha.

After we finished eating, we headed in to get changed, those of us who intended to get in the water, at least. I texted Kate and let Jarvis know that she'd be arriving in the next hour and to let Tony or me know when she got there.

Even my parents and Bruce changed, which surprised me. Pepper handed us sunscreen as she kept a lot of it on hand. With her fair skin, she would burn quickly in this strong sunlight. Jace, Chloe and I raced down to the water, putting on life jackets and going for the jet skis. Chloe went up behind Jace since they often partnered together. They took off while I waited for Steve. I had him climb on behind me after we gave up on finding a life jacket that would fit him. His shoulders were way too broad for any of Tony's jackets. 

"I don't need one anyway, Sarah. I'll be fine."

"You say that now, but you don't know how we ride these things. The goal is to get the others to tip over. Last jet ski upright wins." He looked at me skeptically as I climbed on and hooked the kill cord to my vest.

"Are you sure that's what you're supposed to do with them?"

"It's not, but it's more fun this way. Trust me?" I asked him with a wide grin.

"Is that a rhetorical question?"

"Kind of; I'm driving. Climb on already." 

"All right, all right. I'm on."

"Hold on tight, Steve. I drive it like I stole it."

I felt him laugh as he wrapped his arms around me. I started the jet ski and we zoomed over to where Jace and Chloe were waiting. I saw Nat and Clint getting on one, Natasha driving, of course. Tony and Pepper took one, leaving Maria and Bruce. Bruce let Maria drive, which was probably a good choice. He looked a little uncertain. My parents actually got on the last one, but I knew they would just tootle around on it, checking out the riverfront. They didn't approve of the way my friends and I drove them. We all met out on the water and I laid out the rules. 

"Ready everyone? We're playing King of the River. Anything goes as long as it's only jet skis, no-crashing, no punching, no jumping on to someone elses' ski – Jace I'm talking to you – last ski upright is the winner. Anyone who's not playing speak now or forever hold your peace. Any questions?"

"We're not playing, Sarah," said my dad. "We're going to cruise up and down the river for a while."

"Okay Dad, have fun. Stay closer to the middle, the edges are pretty shallow."

They waved and took off. No one else said anything so I said "Ready, Set, Go!" and zoomed away. Jace chased after me and we circled until my reversal almost tipped them. The others joined in after seeing what we were up to. Maria and I took out Tony after a short dogfight while Nat and Jace were going at it. I went back after Jace, leaving Nat to chase after Maria. Steve was a good passenger, knowing how to throw his weight to our best advantage. 

Neither Jace or I could get the upper hand, so I gave up and went after Nat. I lucked out and the wake from Jace chasing me helped me tip them over. They were laughing as they righted the ski, so I took off after Maria again. Jace tipped them before I got there, though. Maria had over-corrected on a turn and down they went. Jace and I really went at it until Steve's heavier weight on the back kept me from coming out of a turn. We went under and I fought the life jacket to keep from surfacing too soon and getting run over. Steve surfaced right after I did, laughing.

"Wow. That was something else."

We righted the ski and I looked over to see Jace celebrating. He should have watched his back though, because Nat had drove back over by us and Clint had hopped on the tail of their ski to tip them before jumping back onto his and Nat's ski.

"New partners for the next round?" asked Tony as he and Pepper came up. "Rhodey and someone else are here."

"Sure. I'm game. Switch out at the dock?" I replied.

"Meet you there," said Nat.

We zoomed in and saw that Sam was the other man. Both men were already on the dock in their trunks, waiting for us to come in. I hopped off to give Sam a hug.

"Sam! Thanks for coming!"

"Thanks for finally calling, pooka. You know I wouldn't miss taking Jace out again."

"You guys are crazy," said Pepper. "I'm going to lay out and dry off until you're ready to take the boats out."

"I agree," said Bruce. "Once was enough for me, too."

"What do you say, Sam? Ready for a rematch?" I asked, pointing at Jace.

"Only if I get to drive. Chloe want to ride with me this time?" said Sam, smiling down at the small blond.

"You're less crazy than Jace, right?" Chloe asked doubtfully as she climbed up on the dock.

"Who do you think taught him his moves?" Sam said, laughing.

"Never mind - I choose someone less crazy." She looked around the group and decided that Steve was probably the safest. She was still too scared of Tony and didn't know Rhodes. "Steve? You can drive. I'm not very good at this," said Chloe with a smile.

"Sure, Chloe. I'd like to try it," said Steve, helping her climb on. She put her arms as far around Steve as she could and they took off so Steve could practice driving the jet ski.

"I'll take Rhodes then. Ready to kick some butt Rhodey?" I said, giving him a high five. 

"You bet your ass, Sarah." Rhodes climbed on.

"Clint, you can't ride with Nat again," said Tony. "If you ask nicely, maybe Maria will let you drive."

"I suppose, since I drove last round. Hop on Barton," said Maria, scooting back so Clint could get on.

"Nat, you're with me, then," said Tony.

"Then I'm driving because you're too cautious, old man." Nat smirked at him. "We're out to win this, Tony." 

"You're gonna kill me! Never mind, I'm not that crazy. I've decided I want to live after all." Tony climbed off and padded off the dock to go lay by Pepper as we laughed.

* * *

Sarah's POV

"All right, Sam, let's see what you got," said Natasha, moving so he could get on. I could see how excited he was to ride with her. I couldn't tell if he blushing or not, but I figured he probably was; Natasha was looking pretty hot today.

"Sweet!" Sam climbed on, leaving Jace stag.

"Tony, is Kate here yet?" I called, realizing she hadn't shown up yet. "I told Jarvis she was coming a while ago."

"I'll check with Jarvis. Hold on."

"Pepper, are you sure you don't want to try again?" Jace called out, "I need you for balance."

"Nope, I like dry land just fine. Sorry Jace, I've seen you drive and I can honestly say that Tony wasn't the most reckless one out there for once."

We laughed at that and waved the others off to go dink around while they waited for us to be ready.

"Jarvis said she's changing and then she'll be down," Tony said.

"Great! Rhodey, if you want to come back to get me, I'm going to go show her the way."

"Sure. Is she cute?"

"Yup. Single too." I dropped my wet life jacket on the dock and ran up to the house.

"Jarvis, where's Kate?" I asked as I came inside.

She is just coming down the stairs, Sarah.

"Perfect, I'll go to her." I walked over to the stairway to see the blond coming down the last few steps. "Kate - perfect timing. Bruce, Tony and Pepper chickened out, so we need you ASAP."

"What is it that we're doing that you need another girl?" Kate said, looping her arm through mine and letting me lead her to the door.

"Water wars. Each jet ski has to have a guy and a girl to win. One person ones are too hard to tip and two guys are always too heavy, so they whine when they lose. Do you need sunscreen? It's pretty bright out on the water."

"Yes, I burn easy otherwise. You tip them?"

"You'll see. It's fun. Are we telling everyone your cover? I think Natasha, Maria and I are the only ones who know you're really with Shield."

"That's the plan." 

I sprayed her with sunscreen and led her down to the life jackets. "You're riding with my best friend Jace Barnes. He won the last round, so you have the advantage there."

"Barnes?" She looked at me quizzically. "As in Bucky Barnes?"

I grinned in return. "Yup. Same family, believe it or not. He can tell you about it." 

We found her one to fit and walked out on the dock. Jace and Rhodey came over when they saw us standing there. I put back on my still wet life jacket and zipped it up.

"Jace, this is my neighbor, Kate. She finally got done with her family stuff so she could come play with us. Kate, this is Jace."

"Hi Kate. Hop on." He flashed her a wide grin, patting the seat behind him.

"You didn't tell me he was cute," Kate murmured, giving me a wink. I laughed and pushed her towards him.

"See you out there." I hopped on behind Rhodey and wrapped my arms around him. "On a scale of Pepper to Natasha, how aggressive are you on these things, Rhodey?"

"I started in the Air Force as a pilot, Sarah."

"We'll do fine then."

Finally we were all out on the water. "Everyone, say hi to my neighbor Kate. This was as soon as she could make it here."

"Hi Kate. Thanks for coming," said Steve, sounding surprised.

"No problem, Steve. This sounds interesting."

He gave her wide grin. "You said it."

"Ready, Set, GO!" I shouted and we took off. Rhodey was a pretty good driver, a little more cautious than I was, though. This round lasted a lot longer, mostly because everyone knew how it went now. Rhodey and Sam went after Steve and Chloe first; he was clearly the least experienced of all of us, but he caught on pretty quick. Clint and Jace were going at it until Clint ended up getting caught in the wash from everyone around them. 

Steve and Chloe were the next to go down and Rhodey made me work to keep us balanced as we went after Jace. We managed to pull out of the maneuver before we tipped ourselves, only to stall momentarily. Jace went after Sam again, seeing that we were momentarily disabled. The kill cord had caught on the handlebars, so Rhodey untangled it and restarted the jet ski. By that time, Sam was on his way over, avoiding Jace. 

Rhodey and Sam shared a grin, turning back to take Jace on; there was no way they were going to let him win again. Kate was laughing as they went over, so I took that as a good sign. Sam then came back to take us on but was a little too aggressive, because he ended up taking out himself and Natasha instead. I gave Rhodey a high five and we all headed back to shore, ready for a short break from King of the River. Some of the others wanted to just zoom around for a bit, so I climbed back on behind Steve and we went to check out the river traffic. 

"How was that for you, Steve?"

"That was pretty fun," he said with a smile. "I didn't realize you all were so competitive."

I snorted. "You've met the team, right? I'm pretty sure competitive is both Jace and Sam's middle name."

Steve chuckled at that. "It's nice that Kate could come."

"Yeah. She got here at the perfect time. So am I going to have to worry about Nat getting revenge for me tipping her?"

"I don't think so, but no promises. You'd have to ask Clint on that."

"Will do." I rested my head on his back, just enjoying the ride. Eventually we headed back to the dock. Tony and Jace were getting things ready for skiing when we parked our jet ski, so Steve went over to give them a hand.

Kate and Sam were chatting with Chloe, Clint and Maria. Everyone looked like they were having fun, so that was good. Checking my phone, I could see that we still had three hours before we needed to get cleaned up for the party. I headed over to the group to find out who was going to go out on the boat with us.

"So who here already knows how to water ski? I know Jace, Sam and I do. Steve says he wants to learn. Kate?"

"I know how to, but I haven't in quite a while."

"Clint?"

"I know how, but I'll leave that up to you young things today." 

I rolled my eyes at him and snorted. "Cuz you're so ancient, Hawkeye. Maria? How about you?"

"I'd like to learn if we have time."

"Chloe? You ready to try again?"

"Nope. I am content in my cowardice. You and Jace have tried to teach me for as long as you've known me, Sarah. It's just not happening."

"All right," I said, smiling at her. "I give up on you. Happy?"

"Very. Are there any yard games? I owe you a rematch on cornhole."

"What on earth are you talking about?" Clint asked, staring at us.

"You know that beanbag toss thing you play at carnivals?"

"Yeah?"

"There's a yard version called cornhole. I had Jarvis order a set of yard games, but I don't know where they're at right now. Let me ask Tony."

I walked over to the boat. "Papi, where did you put those yard games when they came in? They should've come last week sometime."

"In the garage, kitten. There were three big boxes, but I never got around to opening them."

"Okay. Steve, Jace, do you want to help me get them out here?"

"Sure. We'll be right behind you."

I walked up to the garage and opened the door. Sure enough, there the boxes were. I pushed them up to the door and we all grabbed one and headed back down to the group.

"Found them!" I called out. "Lets see what's in them."

"I call yard darts. I like sharp pointy things." said Clint, smirking at Natasha.

"They don't have points anymore, Clint." I said, bursting his bubble. "Too many people managed to put them through a foot."

"No points? Where's the fun in that?" he griped, opening the large box to pull out the assortment inside.

"No hospital visits today, Clint. Kate has the day off for a reason."

"That's right. A puncture wound like that is gonna put you out of commission for at least a week," Kate said, giving him a look before turning to me. "I didn't think you could get the pointy ones anymore?"

"You can't. They don't make them, probably because of people like Clint." I elbowed him and he poked my ticklish spot. 

"Boats ready," said Tony. "I can take six with up to two skiers at a time."

"Great. Jace, Sam, Steve, Maria, Kate and I are all there are for skiers unless anyone else wants to." We looked around, but everyone else shook their heads, clearly more interested in the yard games. 

"All right," said Tony. "If you're skiing, grab a life jacket and head to the boat." 

I linked my arm with Steve's as we walked to the boat. "Ready? You can watch us first and Jace and Sam can explain it to you. I get up a little differently than they do; I don't care for their way." I stopped to grab my life jacket and put it on.

Jace and Sam came up arguing about who was going to go first, so I dropped back to walk with Tony and he put his arm around my shoulders. "Thanks for doing all this today, Papi. It's been a blast."

He squeezed me gently. "You haven't even seen the fireworks yet, kitten."

"I can't wait! I love watching them - and setting them off."

"You're a pyro like your old man then?"

I rolled my eyes and poked him in the side. "Yup, I take after you when it comes to that kind of stuff - the bigger the better."

We all climbed in the boat and settled in to leave the dock. Jace and I were going together, it wasn't often we could both ski together at the same time. The lake we usually went to back home was pretty small and the boat we used didn't have a lot of get up and go. In no time we were where Tony wanted to be and he killed the motor. Jace and I jumped in and Sam handed us our skis and ropes.

We were ready pretty quickly and Tony started taking out the slack. Right on cue we started coming out of the water as he picked up speed. I grinned at Jace and we gave Sam the signal for Tony to floor it. We eased into the feel until the wake got to where we wanted it. With a nod to each other, we started in on our trick skiing, doing jumps, springs and rolls until I landed funny and wiped out. I popped up as Tony swung around, looking for my skis. They'd scattered, but I got both of them back on by the time the rope was coming by. Jace looked over at me, a huge grin on his face.

"Once more and then we'll change out for a while?" He shouted.

"Sounds good!" I caught my rope, shouting 'ready.' This time I stuck the landing I'd missed but Jace missed his a couple minutes later. Tony swung around and I climbed in the boat after handing up my gear. We went back to get Jace and I went up front by Steve. "What did you think?"

"I didn't know you could do that. It was pretty neat to watch from here. Was it fun?"

"Yeah. I love the rush! You ready, Kate? Sam's gunna go this round too before we teach Steve and Maria."

"Sure. I've never learned how to do tricks, though."

"Most people don't. One of my dad's friends coached the local ski team, so Jace and I joined it for a summer to learn how to do them. We put on shows and everything." I grinned, thinking back to that summer.

Jace got in then, so I went back to help get things ready for Sam and Kate. She knew the signals, so that was helpful. They got in the water and geared up and Jace told me to go be the communicator for them. I sat up by Steve and told Tony what they wanted. They did pretty good, staying up for a decent amount of time before Kate went down. Sam rode out the turn and let loose to even up with Kate for another pass. She was much more confident on this pass, and it showed. She looked beautiful, blond hair flying, blue eyes sparkling and laughing happily; no wonder Jace couldn't keep his eyes off her, not that it was a bad thing.

Finally, they decided they'd had enough, and we picked them up. Steve and Maria had decided that she would go first, so I went back to get in with her again. I was going to get a workout this time because we were going to be stopping and starting a lot. We got in the water and I made sure she got her skis on right, getting them pointing the right way. I gave her a rope and told her what she was going to be doing. 

I gave the signal, and Tony took up the slack, starting to bring us up. She got up on the first try and I shed my skis to slalom for a bit, signaling Jace. He nodded and I looked back over to Maria. She did good until the wake shifted and she lost her balance. I let go and swam back to help her with her skis. One had floated pretty far away.

"Thanks, that was easier than I thought it would be."

"It helps that we have a good driver. That can make all of the difference sometimes. Ready to try again?"

"Sure. Where are your skis?"

"I dropped them a while back. I can barefoot just fine once we get up to speed since I don't have my trick skis with today. Makes it easier for me to get to you when you go down."

Tony came by and Jace slid me my skis. I preferred not to start barefoot if I didn't have to and he knew that. I signaled that we would take one more round and he nodded. Maria got up again fine, a little faster this time and made it a while longer before going down. I let go right away and swam back to her. 

"You all right? That one looked like it hurt."

"I'm fine. Just got the wind knocked out of me for a moment."

"I hate it when that happens. You did great, though. You picked it up pretty quick for never having done it."

"Thanks. We'll have to do this again sometime. I know Clint and Nat both ski well, too."

I handed Jace the gear as Maria climbed in and then I followed her. Jace was talking through the process with Steve, giving him a verbal run through. I squeezed Steve's arm and smiled as I passed him on the way to the front. They jumped in and we went to take up the slack. Sam was watching for the signals, so I was Tony's communicator again. 

Steve did great for never having seen waterskiing before today. Jace was a good teacher, so he got Steve up right away. Steve overbalanced and went down shortly after getting up and we swung back to get them. Steve managed to stay up for longer the second time before the wake of a passing boat caught him wrong. He decided that he was done, so we packed up to head back to the dock. It was time to get cleaned up for the party, anyway.


	23. Happy Birthday Steve!

Steve's POV

So far, it had been a pretty good birthday. I had gotten to spend time with my friends and my beautiful girlfriend. I knew she hadn't forgotten it was my birthday, so I wondered what she had up her sleeve. 

Jace and I shared a room to get showered and changed. I let him go first while I found the clothes Sarah had laid out for me from the bag she'd packed this morning. Jace was pretty quick and came out wearing his towel around his hips. 

I walked past him into the bathroom, mentally reconciling the differences between him and Bucky. Physically, at 18 he was in better shape than Bucky had been; his muscles were pretty well defined. They shared the same birthmark as well, a small, slightly darker patch of skin that looked like a star just at the top of the right hip that would blend into a summer tan.

I missed Bucky so much today. I'd always missed him since waking up in this time, but today was the worst. I showered quickly, barely holding myself together. I dried off, wrapping the towel around my waist to go get dressed. Bucky – no, Jace – Jace was buttoning up his shirt but looked over with a smile as I came in the room, and my heart ached like I had taken a bullet to it. I tried not to stare at him, but I suddenly couldn't tell who he was anymore. 

"You okay, Steve? You look like you've got something on your mind."

I sat down on the bed and put my head in my hands, taking a deep breath. He came over and sat next to me, concern on his face.

"Sorry, Jace. I just got caught up in an old memory. Today was always a day where I hung out with Bucky. We'd be all over Brooklyn, doing stuff together before finding a place to watch the fireworks. You still remind me of him a lot."

"Is that good or bad?"

"Both. You being here has made today a little easier for me." I fought to keep my voice steady as it threatened to crack. "I just... miss him... a lot."

Jace put his arms around me in the way that Bucky always used to back when I was scrawny Steve. I turned into him and rested my forehead on his shoulder, drawing in a shaky breath. I had promised myself that I wasn't going to lose it today, and I didn't want to break that promise. Jace must have realized how close I was to breaking down, because he just held me tight. I put my arm around him and I held onto him for a long moment, just concentrating on breathing. It helped that he didn't smell like Bucky, because right then he felt like Bucky. He spoke quietly in my ear, his voice not quite steady either.

"You know he's looking out for you still, right? He's just not right next to you like you'd thought he'd be. It's okay with me if you pretend I'm Bucky tonight, Steve."

I finally let go of him when I thought I could hold it together. I gave him a wistful smile and shook my head. "It wouldn't be right, Jace. But thank you. If I let myself think you're him now, what's to keep me from doing it again? I have to move on, as hard as that is sometimes. He's not coming back." That hollow feeling was back, and I felt completely alone again. Jace put his hand on my neck and I met his eyes, the familiar cerulean filled with concern. 

"You're right," he said quietly. "You're a great guy, Steve - you know that?"

"Thanks. You're pretty great yourself, Jace." He let go of me and stood up, walking into the bathroom as I started to get dressed. 

He flashed me Bucky's crooked grin when he came back out and I had to look away, the pain was so intense. I shrugged into my shirt and pulled it on, standing up to button it and tuck it in.

"Come on, Steve - we're gonna be the last ones downstairs." 

I went back in the bathroom to comb my hair and my eyes weren't as red as I thought they'd be. "Go on ahead; I'll be right behind you. Just have to put my shoes on."

Sarah was waiting in the bedroom when I came back out. She gave me a huge smile and I felt my heart stop for a moment again; she was so beautiful. Her long, dark, curly hair cascaded down her back, her golden brown eyes full of happiness and something else I couldn't place. She always made me feel like I was where I belonged, at least when I was with her. She stepped closer to me, wrapping her arms around my torso. I pulled her into my arms, kissing her with an intensity that left us both breathless. She pulled back, resting her head on my chest and rubbing her hands over my back.

"They're waiting for you, Steve. You're the last one down tonight."

"Sorry. Lost track of time, I guess."

"It's okay. Ready?"

"As I'll ever be." I offered her my arm and we went down the steps. Sarah led me to the dining room and opened the door, taking my hand and pulling me inside. It was then that I noticed that everyone was there and waiting for me.

"Happy Birthday, Steve!" they cried, startling me. I felt a huge smile on my face as I took it all in. I didn't know how she'd managed to pull this off, but I was glad she had. 

"Surprise, Steve. Bet you thought I forgot your birthday." Sarah squeezed my hand and smiled up at me. 

"The thought had crossed my mind. Thank you." I tilted her face up and gave her a gentle kiss. The room broke out in applause and I remembered we had an audience. She laughed as my face flushed, pulling me forward again. Everyone we passed took a moment to say happy birthday and give me a hug or a kiss on the cheek or both. For as empty as I'd felt a short time ago, my heart was overflowing at this show of affection from my friends. 

Eventually, I made it to where Sarah wanted me at the table and Clint came in carrying a big cake with almost a hundred candles on it. I glanced over at Natasha, who smirked, taking pictures of it all. There was a lot of laughter and I could have sworn one of Tony's robots was holding a fire extinguisher in the corner.

"I had the wrong number on the last one." Natasha shrugged. "This time I got it right. Happy 94th birthday, Steve. Make a wish and blow out the candles."

I looked over at Sarah and she nodded. I closed my eyes and then blew out the candles. I almost got them all in one breath, but that was a lot of candles. Clint moved the cake out of the way and Nat brought over a pile of gifts.

"Guys, you didn't have to get me anything," I protested. 

Tony clapped me on the shoulder with a smile. "You missed a lot of birthdays doing time as a Capsicle. We're all glad they finally found you, even if it took longer than anyone ever thought it would. Happy Birthday, Gramps." He pointed to a red and gold wrapped box. "Go on, open it."

I tore the colorful paper off to find an old Yankees baseball cap and an equally old but more beat up Brooklyn Dodgers baseball cap. I promptly put the Dodgers hat on, smiling as it slipped right on, fitting perfectly.

"Thanks, Tony, Pepper! This is great!"

"Open the one from me and Clint next," said Natasha, smiling widely and pointing at a large, festively wrapped box. 

I tore off the paper and opened the box, pausing as I absorbed what it was. It was a full paint set – artist quality.

"The easel is already at your apartment, along with some canvas to get you started." Clint grinned at Natasha before looking back at me. "I don't like to wrap things." Everyone chuckled and I smiled.

"Thanks Clint, Nat. I needed this."

"This one's from Archie, Jace and I, with a little help from Mr Stark and Agent Hill to make the arrangements." Mrs Evans slid over a longer, thin box. I broke the tape and pried it open. Inside were tickets to a baseball game this weekend for Jace, Mr Evans, Sarah and the team. We were going to see the Nats play the Rockies.

"That's great! Thanks, everyone. We're all going to a baseball game Saturday. We're going to have a blast!"

"This one's from me, Steve," said Bruce with a smile. It was a little piece of metal and glass that I'd seen before; I think Sarah used one like this when she went running. I looked up at him curiously. "It's an iPod. Sarah told me you enjoyed listening to music, so we loaded your whole vinyl collection on here for you so you can listen to whatever you want any time of day. She'll show you how to run it."

"Thanks, Bruce! Some of those records were kind of hard to find."

"And this last one is from me," said Sarah. It was a large flat box. I tore off the paper and lifted the lid. I paused before lifting the items out of the box. She had gotten me a set of pencils and pens and a couple of different weight papers for me to draw and sketch on. I felt her wrap her arms around my shoulders. "Do you like it?" she asked quietly in my ear.

"I love it. It's perfect. How did you know?"

"I had a little help. Jace's great-aunt Rebecca said that you loved to draw and that every year Bucky would get you new pencils because you would have worn the old ones out by then."

"He did. I did. Thank you so much." I stood up and hugged her, needing her to ground me. I spoke over her to everyone in the room. "Thank you so much, all of you!"

"Food is ready in the kitchen if you want to help yourself. We'll go outside at dusk for the fireworks display," announced Pepper, smiling fondly at us.

I stood there, holding on to Sarah while everyone made their way to the kitchen to get food. When the room was empty, Sarah looked up at me and stood on her tiptoes to give me a kiss. 

"I'm glad you liked it. I was a little worried that it was going to make you sad instead."

"It was just what I needed. I've been missing Bucky all day today, so it was good that he could be here, in a way."

"He's always with you, Steve, just not where you'd hoped he be." Her eyes held mine for a long moment before she asked, "Ready to eat? I'm starving."

"Yeah. Let me move all of this stuff out of the way so it doesn't get ruined." I packed it all up in the box that Sarah had given me. Everything fit in it and I set the box on a side table by the door before following her to the kitchen to get food.

I couldn't ever remember laughing so much at a meal before. The team had been drinking since we got done playing King of the River, so they'd decided to tell Sarah all of the difficulties I'd run into attempting to assimilate into this modern era, from phones, to computers to my first encounter with Jarvis. My sides hurt from laughing so hard. At the time, I'd been frustrated by my inability to grasp the concept of modern technology, now I could see the humor in it.

Maria's story took the cake, though. She told Sarah about how she'd been saddled with my sorry butt after the Battle of New York, getting me assimilated to Shield. She'd started by pulling up the Shield protocol file and having me read it on a tablet. 

"At the time, I didn't know that Steve hadn't been taught how to use a tablet and he never told me he didn't know. I'm pretty sure that if I'd asked, he would have told me, but I didn't ask. So I left him in my office reading it while I went to get more coffee. I could hear the sound of breaking electronics from the conference room. By the time I got back, Steve was standing up, holding the remains of the tablet in his hands. I asked him: Rogers, what did you do?

He handed me the broken tablet and said, I quote, "Sorry, it was an accident. I hit the button to turn the page and it told me to slide to unlock. So I slid it. I guess I don't know my strength, sometimes."

It didn't look like he had meant to destroy it, so I asked him: "Did you slide your finger over the notification?"

He gave me the most confused look, so I took out my phone and demonstrated. His eyes got big and he shook his head apologetically before telling me: "I slid the strange book on the desk. Well, it started out on the desk at least. Sorry, Agent Hill." She finished her drink and set it on the counter amid the laughing response she got from everyone.

I stepped over to Maria and gave her a big hug, startling her by picking her up off the ground as they all laughed harder. She didn't bother to fight me, knowing she was a solid foot off the ground. She was shorter than Sarah, but not by much. 

"Put me down, Steve," she laughed, hands on my shoulders as I gave a kiss on the cheek and she blushed appealingly.

"Thank you, Maria. I'm sorry Fury stuck you with me. Anyone else would probably have washed their hands of me after that."

I set her back on her feet and she patted my chest. "Steve, you have no idea of how well you do the sad puppy dog look. I couldn't just sit you in the corner when you didn't know what you were doing."

Natasha laughed. "That's the perfect way to describe that look."

I quirked a brow at her amid the laughter. She pulled up a picture on her phone and showed it to me. "This is what you look like when you break some piece of technology that isn't Cap-proof. Like the brand new washer we had put in your apartment after you moved in and your clothes got stolen."

"What did you do to the washer, Steve?" Sarah asked. I'd never told her about that incident.

"It got stuck mid-cycle, so I went to open the door to rearrange the load, like you have to do to the ones downstairs."

"Steve, you have a front load washer," said Sarah, guessing where this was going.

"Apparently you don't do that with that kind of washer," I replied.

"No, no, you don't. Luckily, the warranty people decided it was a faulty washer, not that Captain America had ripped the door off accidentally." Natasha said with a smirk.

"So that's why there was water all over the hallway?" asked Kate from where she was standing by Jace.

"How long ago was that?" asked Sarah.

"The end of May. Thank goodness you moved in next door shortly after that, Sarah. I don't think I've heard of anything else happening since then," Natasha replied, raising her eyebrows. I put my arm around the feisty redhead.

"I've been too busy to cause trouble, Nat."

She leaned into me, grinning. "Keep telling yourself that, Rogers."

"Well, as amusing as this is, it's dark enough for the fireworks now. They're waiting for us to get situated before they start," said Pepper. "Bring your drinks, we've got a pretty long show planned."

We headed back outside and it was much cooler now that the sun had set. Sarah was walking with Jace and Kate, his arm around Sarah's shoulders and her arm around Jace's waist as they chattered. 

Natasha stayed with me as we headed outside. "Are you okay now, Steve? Sarah said you were a little upset earlier when we got back to the house."

I looked over at Sarah and Jace in the flickering light of the firepits that had been brought in and lit. In my mind, I saw Peggy and Bucky, laughing together around a campfire during a rare break from the war.

"I am now." I said with a smile.

"I know it's been hard for you, being alive in this time." Natasha said, putting a hand on my arm. "We always miss the ones who leave us, Steve, especially when we care about them. Does Jace make it better or worse for you?"

"Better," I said decisively. "He's a good kid. It's like seeing Bucky the way he was before the war, carefree and happy."

"I'm glad we all had the chance to get to know him today. He's young, but I could see him fitting in with the team after he finishes his training. He has the potential to be a great Agent."

"He's a Barnes. Of course he does." 

"Sarah said he's not going to be using the family name at Ops. He's going to be using his mom's maiden name instead."

"To avoid the questions? That seems out of character for him."

She shook her head. "As a safeguard. Ever since WWII, any Barnes that has entered the military has died in service, targeted, in fact, if you read the classified files, which I did after Sarah asked me to. She talked his parents into letting him join Shield, with the caveat that all of his paperwork would be under that name. Director Gregg agreed, as did Fury. When he completes training, he'll have a documented life under that name, courtesy of Sarah."

I understood what she was saying, and I didn't like it. "No wonder Sarah has spent so much time making him do things normal teenagers don't do."

"You would have done the same for Bucky if you could have."

"Without a second thought; they are as close as we were. Why are you telling me this, Nat?"

She looked up at me with a small smile. "You know."

"Softy," I said as I leaned down and kissed her cheek, and she let go of me to go back over to Clint. I did know. As another gift for me, this one was both the best and the worst. She wanted me to have the chance to enjoy the time I had with Jace while I could. While I had technically gained years, physically, I had not aged since the day I had been given the serum; it was likely that I would see him grow old before I would.

I went over to them, standing next to Sarah. She noticed my presence right away, turning to me with a smile and stepping away from Jace.

"Hi. Did you have fun today?" she put her arms around me and leaned her head on my chest. The flickering light played across her face, making her auburn hair glow. 

I leaned down to kiss her, smiling happily. "I did. There were a lot of firsts today for me." Almost everything today had been new, now that I thought about it.

"Good. I'd hate for you to be bored doing the same things all the time. Do you like fireworks?"

"I do. When we were little, Bucky always said they were for my birthday. I believed that until I was a lot older, actually."

She grinned at my naivety, and the fireworks started then, so we looked up at the brilliant display. I watched the joy in her face as she and Chloe exclaimed over the particularly neat ones, Chloe having worked her way back over between Sarah and Jace. 

Chloe had enjoyed her time here with us today, but she was not particularly comfortable with the team. Kate, surprisingly, was fitting in just fine. She seemed like a nice girl, and she was drawn to Jace, even though he was quite a bit younger than she was. There was no more years between them than there was Sarah and I, though.

All too soon the display was over and we headed back in to make our farewells to Sarah's parents and friends. Sam gave us both hugs on the way out the door, tired after a long day of fun. Kate and Sarah had shared a look as they hugged and I gave her a hug as well, making her blush. 

I shook her dad's hand and her mom gave me a hug.

"See you Saturday, Mr Evans."

"Steve, you can call me Archie, you know."

"I'll try to remember that. Thanks for coming today."

"Our pleasure. Now that she's away from home, we don't get to see Sarah as much as we would like."

"I understand. I feel like I hardly get to see her myself and I live next door to her."

He'd smiled and clapped me on the arm, before him and Betty headed outside. Chloe gave us each a hug on the way out and I had kissed her cheek, making her blush.

"Thanks for coming, Chloe. It was great having you here."

"It was nice to meet everyone. You hang out with interesting people, you know."

Sarah and I had shared a smile and laughed. If only she knew the half of it. Jace was the last one down the steps and Sarah held on to him for a long moment as he whispered in her ear. Her eyes were a little bright when she finally let him go with a kiss on his cheek. I pulled him into a tight hug as well.

"Thanks for being here today, Jace. It means a lot to me."

"Any time, Steve. You've got a great team to work with. I only hope that I'll be that lucky when I reach that point."

"You will. You have the potential; I can't wait to see how you turn out." He clapped me on the back and I let him go. "See you this weekend."

That was it for people who were leaving right then. Rhodes was staying over, having had too much to drink while talking with Tony. The rest of the team I would see tomorrow at work. Sarah went to grab our stuff from upstairs and I gathered up my gifts, telling Jarvis I would pick them up tomorrow after movie night. I hadn't expected anything like this, and they wouldn't fit on my bike.

"Bye everyone. See you tomorrow."

Tony, Clint and Bruce waved and Nat saluted me with her bottle of vodka, so I knew they were going to be up for a while. It was already almost midnight, so I was ready for bed after all the excitement today. Sarah stopped in the kitchen to tell everyone goodnight and came over to me. Taking her hand we went out to my bike and drove home.

"Your place or mine?" she asked when we parked in the garage.

"Mine," I said, getting off the bike and taking her hand again. We went up the stairs quietly and Sarah surprised me by coming in with me instead of going to her place first. I gave her a quizzical glance and she gestured to the dryer.

"My pajamas are already here. I showered earlier, so I just have to change."

"Oh. I see." I went to go change into shorts and a t-shirt while she changed out the laundry. She brought the basket in the bedroom when I opened the door again and went into the bathroom to change and brush her teeth. I plugged our phones in and turned the lamp on so I could turn the overhead lights off, shifting the laundry basket so it wasn't going to get tripped over.

I had just climbed in the bed when Sarah came into the bedroom and the sight of her took my breath away as my cock hardened instantly. She was wearing a sheer, lacy, thin strapped nightie and a mischievous smile. She came over to the bed and I swallowed, my throat suddenly dry, not knowing what she had planned, but unable to tear my eyes off of her. 

"You don't know how hot you look right now," I said, certain she was planning on pushing my boundaries some more today. She climbed on the bed, leaning over me to kiss me. She moved closer as we kissed, running her hands over my torso, hooking them under my shirt and pushing it up. She had somehow managed to straddle my hips without me noticing. 

I gave in to her tugging on my shirt and curled forward so she could pull it over my head. The minx leaned back down to kiss me as she trapped my hands in my shirt and pushed them over my head, holding them there as a command.

"You don't know how hot you look right now. I've wanted to touch you like this all day, Steve. All these lovely muscles were on display and I couldn't touch you with everyone there." Her voice was husky and the sight of her looking down at me in satisfaction, pinning me down, made me harden even more, almost painfully. 

"I want to touch you everywhere, Steve. Can I do that?" she asked as she splayed her small hands on my chest and ran them gently up and down, barely touching my skin.

"Yes." I rasped as goosebumps rose to the surface. "Do I get to touch you, too?" I shivered as she scraped my skin with her fingernails. 

"Maybe...if you're good." Her smile was wicked as she skated her fingers lightly over my arms, tracing the muscles. I fought the need to crush her to me, tensing as she reached my belly and lightly followed the ridges of my abs. She was driving me crazy, touching me everywhere like this. She had touched me before, but never for so long or so precisely. 

My breaths were shallow as she leaned over to kiss me again, working her way down my neck to my torso. I couldn't stand it anymore, so I freed my hands from my shirt and tossed it off the bed. I went to reach for her, but she pushed my hands back up again. The motion rubbed her body over my aching cock, drawing a groan from me.

"No, Steve, keep them there for now. I'm not done exploring yet."

"You're killing me, Sarah."

"No, this is killing you." With a sultry smile, she drew off her nightie, tossing it aside. "You can look but you can't touch." I exhaled loudly, my eyes taking in every beautiful inch of her. "Did you know, when aroused, your pupils dilate? It's an involuntary response." She leaned over me, her bare breasts rubbing across my chest, as I watched her slowly bring her face down to mine. I cleared my throat so I could respond to her.

"No, I didn't." I looked up at her and smiled, because her eyes were so dark there was barely any color left to the iris. I was certain mine were the same, but I asked anyways. "How big are my eyes?" I stared into her golden brown eyes, knowing that this was affecting her as much as it was me, maybe more even.

"So dark I can't hardly see the blue." 

"I want you, Sarah, you know that. I've always wanted you from the first day I met you."

"I'm not done touching you yet, Steve. Tonight is for me to explore you."

"I can't take much more, Sarah."

"That's the point."

I groaned quietly, and she kissed me again, deeper this time before going back down my torso, she worked her fingers under my waistband and nibbled on my hip bones. I pulled her back up, kissing her deeply. "As much as I know I'm going to regret this, I'm not ready for this yet, Sarah."

She pouted nicely, sticking out her lower lip. "But you looked like you were enjoying yourself."

I laughed quietly, meeting her eyes. "I am, doll. Just let me hold you, okay?" I captured her lips again, kissing her like never before, running my hands up and down her soft skin, until we were both gasping for breath. She laid her head down on me, smiling widely.

"Mkay, if it means you'll kiss me like that again." 

"Anytime, doll." I covered us up, rolled on my side and put an arm over her, watching her falling asleep.

Sarah's alarm woke us the next morning, light coming in through the window. She rolled over to hit snooze before turning back to me for a kiss.

"Morning," she said, smiling at me.

"Morning," I replied, pushing her hair back so I could see her face. I loved seeing her like this first thing in the morning, hair mussed and sleepy eyed. I leaned over her and kissed her, and she pulled me closer to her until I was half laying on her. Her alarm went off again and I let her go. 

"Ready for the day?" she asked me, as I sat up.

"I wish we didn't have to get up today. I could spend the whole day here with you." I smiled down at her, taking her hand in mine and kissing her palm.

"Hmmm. But we can't today. I'm going home to get in the shower. See you at work?"

"Yeah. I might be late, depending on how the day goes, but I'll see you at Tony's tonight no matter what."

"Okay." She gave me one last kiss before climbing out of bed, the sight of her hot, well toned body making me instantly hard again. She bent to pick up her nightie and pulled it on, grabbing the light sweater she kept here for over her nighties and picked up the laundry basket to take with her. 

"Bye," she looked back at me on the way out grinning mischievously. I groaned and freed myself from the covers when I heard her leave.


	24. Take Me Out To the Ball Game

Steve's POV

I woke up later than usual, reaching over for Sarah, only to find the bed next to me empty. I sat up and stretched before getting out of bed to go find her. She wasn't anywhere in my apartment, so I went to grab my phone to call her, smiling when I found her sticky note on top of my phone: Went to go workout downstairs. Be back soon. P.S. My parents and Jace are coming up this morning, so decide where you want to go for lunch. - S

I still had time to get a quick run in, so I found a workout shirt and pulled it on before putting on my shoes and setting up my music. Sarah had taught me how to work the iPod Bruce had given me for my birthday, so I thought I would try running with it like she did. I scribbled a quick note and set it on the table for Sarah before heading out the door.

I met Kate on the stairs, she was just getting back from her run I could tell.

"Morning, Kate." I paused to talk to her for a moment. She looked a little surprised that I was seeking her out, and I didn't blame her. Until the other day I really hadn't ever talked to her.

"Morning, Steve." She said, taking her earbuds out. "You're running late today."

I smiled slightly. "Overslept. We went to the drive-in last night and didn't get home until late." I looked over at her, making a quick decision. "Do you have plans tonight?"

"Not really, why?" She cocked her head at me, raising an eyebrow.

"I was wondering if you wanted to go the baseball game with us tonight?" She looked a little hesitant, so I continued, "Jace said Sarah's not huge into sports and Chloe can't come, so I thought it would be nice for her to have a friend to visit with during the game. They're are usually a couple hours long." Her expression cleared, so that must be an acceptable reason to ask her to come with. 

Kate smiled at me warmly. "Oh. Yeah, sure! I've never been to a professional game."

"Great! We've got a ticket for you already, and you can ride with us if you want."

She nodded, leaning back against the wall. "Sure. What time are you leaving?"

"Probably sometime around 4. I'll let you know when I find out."

"Sarah has my number, so just send me a text, okay?" 

"Okay. Thanks, Kate!"Other people started coming up the stairs, so she started moving again. I nodded before moving on.

"Anytime, Steve. Enjoy your run."

"I will."

I put in my earbuds and smiled to myself as I made my way out of the building. I knew how long games could go, so I was glad Sarah would have someone to visit with if I got absorbed in the game like I used to. I set out at a fast pace, the miles flying by as I took my usual route past the Washington monument and the reflecting pool. It was a warm morning already, so I was soaked with sweat by the time I turned back home. 

My phone buzzed just as I was slowing down for the last block. I took it out and slowed to a walk. 

"Hey Sam. I didn't see you out running today."

"That's cause I'm already done for the morning. Did you sleep in or something?"

"Yeah. Sarah turned off my alarm since we didn't get home until 1 am from the drive-in."

"All right, I suppose that's a good excuse. What time are you guys heading to the stadium?"

"Around 4. Are you meeting us there?"

"Yup. Sarah dropped my ticket off yesterday on her way to work. She said Tony got a private box?"

"Yeah, he said that since it's going to be such a packed game, Nat and Maria didn't want us out in the open in such a crowd."

"This have anything to do with the pictures in the paper from the 4th?"

"Probably. I can't seem to avoid the press."

"Yeah, they love you, man. See you later, Steve."

"Bye, Sam."

I shook my head to myself at this crazy world I lived in now. I couldn't even take Sarah on a date without someone asking for our pictures. I walked up the stairs to my apartment and let myself in. The note was still on the table, so Sarah hadn't been by yet. 

I showered, shaved and got dressed, puttering around in my apartment, cleaning since I hadn't taken the time to dust and sweep in a while. I was just finishing the dishes when Sarah let herself in, just finished with her workout. She came up next to me and leaned on the counter, smiling up at me.

"Hey Steve. I see you've been busy. I'm just going to get cleaned up if you want to come over in a little bit."

I leaned over and gave her a kiss. "Sure thing, doll. Have a nice workout?"

"Yeah. I boxed for a while and then danced. Nat said I need to work on a few things."

"She did? Like what? You dance great."

She laughed lightly, "Oh, Steve. My form is horrible. That's what happens when you don't do something very much, you get rusty! Did you go for a run?"

"Yeah. I talked to Kate and she said she'd come and Sam said he's meeting us there."

"Great! Thank you, Steve!" She stretched up to give me another kiss. "I'm glad Kate finally said yes. I asked her the other day and she wasn't sure about it. Wonder why she changed her mind?"

"Don't ask me. I barely understand you, Nat and Maria at times, let alone other women."

"You're getting there. You've had a lot to get caught up on, you know."

"I could use an instruction manual for women."

"Why? Men don't read the instructions for anything else – I know that for a fact after growing up with Jace."

I snorted. "I'm not Jace, and he probably should have read some of those directions from what I've heard from you. Go get cleaned up, Sarah. I'll be over in a bit."

* * *

I looked around at everyone in Sarah's small apartment as she raised her voice. "All right everyone, lets go to the stadium! Tony sent a limo for us!"

"He did what?" I asked, staring at her. 

She shrugged and smiled. "Our limo is waiting outside. Pepper sent me a message warning me about it an hour ago. She didn't want us to have to worry about anything."

"Well, that's very nice of her. Archie, lets head down then." Sarah's parents walked out the door, everyone else following. Sarah shut off the lights and locked her door while I knocked on Kate's door. She answered quickly, slipping on her shoes.

"I'm ready. I was just going to come over." 

"Our ride just got here, so we're heading down."

"Hey Kate," Sarah said, coming over to us. "I'm so glad you're coming with." She linked arms with Kate and they chattered on the way down the stairs as I followed behind. I whistled when I saw the large limo parked outside. The driver handed the ladies in and smiled when he saw me.

"Captain Rogers, I'm Happy. I'll be your driver today."

I held out my hand. "Nice to meet you, Happy. Is everyone inside?"

"Yes, sir. You're the last one." He gestured for me to get in and shut the door behind me. I found a seat by the door and looked around. There was still plenty of room even with us all inside. I waved at Tony and Pepper, smiling. Even Maria was here, which surprised me.

"Is Nick coming?" I asked, making her laugh.

"Not a chance. He thinks watching baseball is right up there with watching paint dry."

Sarah moved from her seat to come sit next to me. "What do you think?"

"Sam's going to be pissed when he finds out he missed out." 

"We're picking him up on the way. I texted him as soon as I found out and he sent me his address."

I smiled down at her. "You thought of everything."

"I have one more surprise for you when we get to the stadium."

"Doll, if this is what happens when I give you free rein with our plans -"

She cut me off with a kiss. "You'll like it; I promise. I had a lot of birthdays to make up for and everyone had such good ideas."

I put my arm around her and sat back as she handed me a bottle of beer. I raised an eyebrow at her, but she just grinned before turning to talk to Bruce, who must have come with Tony. Nat was taking pictures of us and I exchanged a look with Clint, who shrugged. 

"I've learned to just go with it. So who's playing tonight?"

We pulled up to the stadium a half hour later, laughing and joking as we climbed out of the limo. I kept my arm around Sarah as she led us to the VIP gate where our park escort was waiting for us. We got a small tour before he led us to our box, which was fully enclosed and air conditioned. I'd never been in anything quite like it. There was catering set up to the side and seats lined up along the windows with a Nationals baseball cap on each chair.

"This is pretty cool, Steve." Jace said, looking around. He pulled his worn in cap off his head and put on the new one after bending the bill. "What do you think?"

"This is crazy. I've never watched a game from one of these before." I gestured to the set up. "I'm not sure it's quite the same."

"There's supposed to be a record crowd tonight, so this was our best option." Maria said, coming up next to me. She smiled in sympathy. "This way the paps can't watch your every move – or Sarah's. Don't get me wrong, you're still going to make the paper, but this way you can see the game in peace."

"I'm not complaining, Maria. This just isn't quite what I expected for a baseball game."

"You're dating Tony's daughter, Steve. He just wants to keep her safe. Shield's been monitoring some low level threats against her lately."

"From who? Why didn't you tell me sooner?"

"The usual suspects. We didn't want you to worry about her. She can take care of herself, you know, just like the rest of the team."

Sarah's parents came up to me just then, so we changed the subject. "What do you think, Mr Evans?"

"Call me Archie, Steve. This is pretty neat. Sure beats sitting in the nosebleed section in this heat. Betty wasn't going to come until Pepper talked to her and explained the set up."

"I'm glad she changed her mind. Does she like baseball?"

"No, but she knows that Jace and I do and she wanted some time to visit with Sarah now that we don't see her as much."

"I understand. Thanks for coming today, it really made Sarah happy you were all here."

"Sarah is a people person, she thrives on this kind of thing – arrangements, parties."

"She's very good at making things happen," I agreed. "It's been a busy week."

Archie clapped me on the back and laughed. "I'll have a word with her, Steve. As far as I know this should be the end of your excitement for a while, though."

"So you don't know what her last surprise is?"

"Oh I do, and I think you'll like it."

Sarah came over to use then and gave me a look. "Are you trying to weasel intel out of my dad, Steve?" She smiled when I nodded sheepishly.

"Maybe – unless you're going to tell me what the surprise is?"

"I'd rather show you. Ready?" She took my hand and lead me to the door of the box where another park escort was waiting.

"I'm all yours, doll," I said as I followed her. I didn't know what she was up to now, but I could tell she was excited about it. The escort took us down to the team locker rooms and after looking inside to make sure everyone was decent, waved us in.

 

* * *

Sarah's POV

Steve was pleasantly surprised when the escort led us down to the locker rooms to introduce him to the teams. I hung back and watched, just glad to see him so happy. He really was a baseball fan because he knew a little about most of the players on the team, saying a little something to all of them. The players were enthused about meeting Captain America and I took a lot of pictures for them, including one of the whole team and Steve. 

During a quiet moment, the owner of the Nationals asked if I thought Steve would like to throw the opening pitch of the game. I pulled Steve aside for a moment to ask him, not wanting to agree to something like that without knowing if he wanted to or not.

"Steve, Mr Lerner wants to know if you would throw the opening pitch tonight."

His cobalt eyes were wide as they found mine. "Really?"

"Yes. He just asked a moment ago. Do you want to?"

"That would be great, Sarah. What do you think?"

"I think you should do it. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity, Steve," I encouraged him. 

"Only if you'll come down with me. I'm concerned that I'll throw too hard and injure the catcher."

"You can warm up with me to get it to an acceptable speed. I can handle your throws." I looked up him and smiled. "Will that work for you?" I asked the owner, who had come back over to us in time to hear the last of our conversation.

"Yes, I believe it will. But how will you be able to help Captain Rogers, Miss Sarah?"

"Don't underestimate her, Ted. There's more to her than meets the eye," Steve said, smiling at me. I only grinned in response, knowing Ted had no idea who I was.

"Then you are a very lucky man, Captain." Mr Lerner said, smiling at us.

"Yes, I am." Steve agreed, tucking my hand in the crook of his elbow. "Where to next?"

"Jim said the Rockies would like to meet you as well, Steve. If you don't mind, that is." 

"Certainly. How are we on time?"

"You still have plenty of time yet before we need to get to the infield. I'll have Pat bring you down when you are done with the Rockies."

"Thanks, Ted." Steve said, shaking his hand. The older man clapped Steve on the back, smiling widely.

"No, thank you, Captain. It's been our pleasure." 

We walked out of the locker room and followed Pat to the other team's locker room. They were expecting us and were just as excited to meet Steve as the Nats had been. I took some more pictures of Steve until Pat let me know that we needed to let the team warm up.

"Thanks for leading us around today, Pat. Is there anyone else we should see today after the opening pitch?"

"As a matter of fact, Miss Sarah, there is. If the Captain doesn't mind, there is a small group of kids from the Children's National Medical Center here today for the game." I looked up at Steve to see what he thought.

"I don't mind," Steve said, smiling at me. "Do we have time now?"

"Yes, it's still an hour before the game starts, Captain."

"Lead on then, Pat." As we followed him, I explained to Steve that these kids had some kind of major medical problem, usually a form of cancer.

"If they're so sick, why would they come to a baseball game?"

"To feel like normal kids on holiday with their families, Steve. Everyone loves a good game and the Nats have been doing well this year. Not all of them are currently having treatment; some of them are in remission."

"Oh. I think I understand now. Is that why you asked?"

"Yes, there's usually a group from the hospital here on weekend home games."

"How did you know that?"

"Jace. He used to be a patient there when we first met. That's why he's such a big Nat's fan. If you ask him about it, he'll tell you. Now's not really the time to talk about it."

 

* * *

Steve's POV

I looked at Sarah in surprise. I hadn't realized that Jace had had cancer. He certainly didn't look like it seeing him now. Pat led us over to a section with a good view of the field, stopping to speak with another worker at the entrance to the seating area. The worker pointed and we followed Pat down to a group of families with younger children. The kids noticed me right away and starting jumping up and down in their seats, making their parents look around for the source of the excitement.

"It's Captain America!" the kids shouted, running down to me. As many times as this happened, I never got used to it. Sarah laughed and went to talk to the parents, organizing them so I could talk to all of them and they could take pictures. 

I raised my hands, gesturing for them to calm down. "Hello, I'm Steve Rogers." The parents wrangled their kids into a line of sorts. I talked briefly with each kid as Sarah took pictures. Finally I had talked to each kid and Pat came extract us. 

"Sorry, kids, but the Captain still has a job to do. The game's about to start and Captain Rogers is throwing the first pitch tonight." Sarah said, smoothly moving me past the kids and steering me down to the infield. "You did great, Steve. They loved you!"

I took her hand as we walked. "I'll never get used to that. Thanks for all your help today. I'd never be able to get this done on my own."

"Well, I kind of got you into it, I guess. You don't mind?" I thought about that and realized that I didn't mind. She hadn't really intended all of the meet and greets, but meeting the ballplayers was pretty neat. The look on those kids' faces was priceless when they knew I was there to see them. Captain America was still the symbol he'd been in the 40's, which amazed me at times.

"Today, no. I'm ready for a little alone time with you after today though." I squeezed her hand and she smiled up at me. "Please tell me you don't have anything planned for tomorrow."

"I don't have anything planned for tomorrow, Steve. We can lay around and do nothing if that's what you want to do."

"Sounds great to me. You know how long it's been since I've thrown a baseball?"

"70 years? Give or take?"

"Probably longer than that." Workers came up then with jerseys for the both of us. I put mine on but couldn't button it. Sarah laughed and traded with me. That one fit me a little better, but I still couldn't close it. She laughed with me as she took a picture of me and showed me what I looked like. They definitely weren't made for men my size, but Sarah was swimming in hers. They handed me a ball and we stood off to the side until they told me to go warm up. I walked to the pitchers mound and Sarah got into position in the box. A catcher came running up, but Sarah spoke to him briefly and he nodded, standing back for right now. 

Sarah nodded and I wound up, letting it go. Sarah caught it easily but shook her head, tossing it back almost as fast as I'd thrown it. She held up five fingers and made a zero and pointed down for 50% less. I threw again and she shook her head again after she caught it, indicating 25% less still. After the third throw, she smiled and indicated that the catcher should come in and she moved off to the side, watching carefully. I repeated my throw with the same amount of power as before, but it still must have been too much force the way the catcher shook his hand afterwards. He threw the ball back and I dialed it down a little more, throwing one more time. The catcher nodded after he got that ball, standing up and walking over to me.

"Holy cow, Captain! That last one was still over a hundred."

"Sorry, I didn't mean to throw that hard." 

"Nah, it's cool. How on earth did your girl catch those earlier ones?"

"Sarah's one of a kind," I said with a grin. "She has to be to keep up with me."

"You got that right! Come over and join us for the anthem, then you get to do your thing." I looked over to see the teams lining up for the anthem and introductions as Sarah went over to the sidelines to wait for me. We jogged over to get into place, Mr Lerner indicating for me to come over by him. I couldn't believe how noisy it was down here on the field. I looked around, seeing the full stands and waving at the kids I'd seen earlier. They bounced excitedly in their seats and waved back, the cameras zooming in on them to put them on the jumbo screens in the stadium, which made them even more excited as they laughed and pointed, bringing a huge smile to my face.

"Am I introducing Miss Sarah, Captain?" Ted asked when I reached him. Sarah shook her head slightly no, and I declined politely for her, taking her hand in mine before she could slip away. If I had to be out here, she was going to be right here with me.

"Thanks, Ted, but she doesn't want to be in the spotlight quite yet." 

"If you're sure, I'll let them know she's just an observer."

"I'm sure. Thank you, though."

He sent a message to the announcer and the crowd started to quiet down as the announcer came over the speakers to get the game started.

"This is so awesome, Sarah!" I said in her ear, putting my arm around her.

"Glad you're enjoying it, Steve! Don't know how I'm going to top this next year!" she said with a huge grin. I laughed, knowing she was being serious, but I still had a whole year to talk her out of her crazy plans.

I did my part, starting the game off to loud applause and cheers, cameras flashing to catch the unexpected start. I wished the team luck and Pat took us back up to the box where everyone else was watching the game. The rest of the night passed quickly after that with Jace, Clint, Archie and I getting into the game. It was a close one up until the end, with the Nats winning in the last inning, 4-1. 

They called our whole box down for their victory celebration, deeming me and Sarah good luck since they'd lost to the Rockies the night before. Jace, Kate and Sam chattered excitedly on the way down with Sarah's parents, Pepper and the Avengers bringing up the rear. Sarah got a lot of hugs and I got a lot of pats on the back. What made me happy was seeing the ball players get even more excited to meet the rest of the Avengers, making them all, even Nat smile.

Finally, by the time we left the field we were almost the last vehicle in the parking lot, other than the workers and players. We dropped off people one by one, chatting contentedly the whole way. Sarah's parents were staying at Tony's tonight, along with Jace, so after we dropped off Sam, Clint and Natasha, it was just Kate, Sarah and I on the last stretch back to our building.

"Did you have a good time tonight, Kate?"

"Yeah, I did. That was pretty awesome, seeing you down there for the first pitch."

"I never expected to do that. I never got around to asking, but was that my last surprise, Sarah?"

"Maybe. Meeting the teams was really all I'd planned. They asked if they could when I talked to the stadium manager to get this all set up a while back."

"You've known me for almost a month, Sarah. How long have you been planning this?"

"Monday, when you were gone for a mission," Sarah said with a grin. "It only took a couple phone calls and Tony's name to get it all lined up in that amount of time. I shook my head as Kate laughed, knowing that it had been all set up by Wednesday.

"So you and Jace, Kate?"

"No, we're just friends. He's not going to have time for a girlfriend at Ops."

"No, I suppose not, but I'm glad you hit it off, Kate." Sarah said, smiling at her friend. "I can't think of a better girl for him than you. I usually hate his girlfriends because they get mad when he hangs out with me."

"But he's your best friend – don't they get that?" Kate looked confused, and I knew there wasn't going to be any problems there.

"He is, but they always think I want him for myself when that couldn't be further from the truth. He's like the brother I never had."

"He totally sees you as his little sister, doesn't he?"

"Yeah, he can be pretty overprotective, but I do the same thing to him at times." 

We shared a look as I laughed, having heard them squabbling more than once over the phone. It was a tossup as to who would win, depending on what they were fighting about. When it was all over and done with, though, there was nothing those two wouldn't do for each other. Seeing them together made me miss Bucky all over again, but each time it hurt a little less. I would always miss him, but nothing I could have done that day would have saved him short of not allowing him to go on the mission with me, in which case I wasn't sure I would be standing here today.


	25. Promise?

Sarah's POV

I noticed when Steve got quiet and I knew he was thinking about Bucky again. There had been a lot of little moments over the past couple days when I knew his thoughts were back in 1945 with Bucky. His face would fall slightly, taking on a wistful expression, and his eyes would glaze over. He'd called me Peggy a lot this week, but he didn't even noticed when it happened unless I said something, making his face fall even more. 

Today had been good, though. This was the first time I'd seen it happen today, and I reached over to twine my fingers with his, squeezing his hand lightly. He snapped out of it and smiled at me just as we came to a stop outside our building. Happy got out and opened up the door. Kate got out first, with Steve and I close behind.

"Happy, can you wait a minute? I have to grab a couple things for you to take back to Tony's with you for my parents." I gestured for Steve to go on ahead, but I saw he said something to Kate and he waited for me on the sidewalk.

"Of course, Sarah." My mom had texted a little bit ago to say that she had left their bags in the vehicle, so I keyed in the code for the door and found them for her, taking them over to the limo.

"Thanks, Happy. They didn't know we were getting such a fancy ride today."

"It was my pleasure. Tony never lets me drive him much anymore."

"I know. It's just one of his quirks. Night, Happy."

"Goodnight, Sarah. Happy birthday, Captain!"

Steve smiled and waved at Tony's bodyguard/chauffeur and put his arm around me as we walked inside. "Kate said thanks again and said she was headed to bed. I think she had a good time, don't you?"

"I do. Jace sure was happy to see her again. What about you, Steve? Did you have a good day?"

"The best." He leaned over and kissed me in the empty stairway before we continued on to our apartments. "Your place or mine tonight?"

"Yours. I'll be over in a bit," I said as we reached our floor, giving him a saucy grin before unlocking my door.

I showered quickly, changing into a silky nightie and pulling on my light sweater robe to cover it before going back to Steve's, locking the door behind me. He was already in bed when I got there, much to my surprise. Normally I beat him out of the shower, but not this time. I took off my sweater and plugged in my phone before turning off the lights to crawl into bed next to him. 

He surprised me again by pulling me up on him as he sat up slightly. I ran my hands over his well-muscled torso, glad that he'd finally left off wearing shirts to bed; I liked the feel of his skin on mine. He captured my lips, kissing me boldly, more aggressively than normal. I felt myself responding to him immediately, and I could feel his rock hard length between us. He held my hips to keep me from moving against him, nibbling down my neck and sliding down my spaghetti straps.

I gasped as he reached my breasts, one hand playing with one while he laved the other, stoking my inner fire. I freed my arms from my straps and ran my hands over him, tangling one in his hair as I arched towards him, giving him full access to my body. As much as I enjoyed this, I knew there was more, and I hoped we were heading in that direction, because I wanted him more than anything.

I rolled us so Steve was on top, sliding my hands down the rippling muscles of his back, slipping them under his sleeping shorts and shoving his shorts down his hips when he pushed himself up so he wasn't crushing me into the bed. He wasn't wearing anything under them and I smiled against his lips as I found his cock and stroked him with my hand, feeling the dampness on his tip already and using it to slick his length. 

He groaned against my neck as I played with him, finally getting the chance to touch him the way I wanted to. He brought a hand up to play with my nipples before sliding it down to the junction of my thighs, finding the little nub in my curls and paying me back in kind. I came quickly, his lips smothering my noises as I writhed beneath him. He wasn't far behind, letting out a quiet gasp as his muscles shuddered, lowering himself onto me as I felt him cum on my belly. He collapsed to the side of me, trying not to lay overmuch on me. 

"What got into you tonight?" I kissed him gently, smiling at him.

"So you liked that?" he chuckled. 

"I did; I think I broke a couple of your rules tonight."

He laughed into my neck before kissing me again. "Rules are made to be broken sometimes. Let's go get cleaned up, doll. I seem to have made a mess on you tonight."

"Hmm. Shower with me?" I asked him, running my fingers through his hair. He looked at me for a long moment before agreeing.

"If you want me to," he said shyly. "I've never showered with anyone before - not outside of a locker room, at least."

I laughed lightly, an evil thought popping into my head. 

Steve noticed though, shaking his head at me and climbing out of bed. "Whatever you just thought of, forget about it. Pretty sure I'm not ready for it yet." I got out of bed, shimmying out of my damp nightie and carrying it into the bathroom to put it in the hamper.

"Maybe - I'm saving it for later, just so you know." I said as I stepped into the shower behind him. He turned on the water and adjusted the temperature before facing me. I smiled as I slowly looked him over, never having seen him completely nude before. His body was even hotter than I thought it would be, defined in all the right places.

I watched as he ran his eyes over me, pleased with myself when I noticed the cobalt of his eyes almost disappearing into a thin blue band around his pupils as he became aroused again. I boldly stepped closer to him, reaching up to put my arms around his neck and going on tiptoe to kiss him as the water ran down over us. I felt his cock hardening again between us as his breathing became shallower. 

As we kissed, his large hands caressing my breasts, kneading and tweaking as he wound me up again. My nipples were already taut peaks and I moaned quietly as he picked me up and held me against the shower wall to lave them, sucking firmly and teasing them. My breaths came quickly as I became even more aroused, wanting something more. I bucked against him when he reached between us to stroke my clit again, bringing me to climax again quickly. 

I relaxed into Steve's arms when my muscles finally stopped shuddering and my breathing became more regular. I stared into his eyes as he moved to set me back on my feet, deliberately sliding myself down his body and watching his reaction. I didn't miss the way his eyes flickered shut and he shifted quickly to keep me from rubbing against his cock.

"That was amazing," I said, kissing him gently. "Do I get to touch you again?"

He smiled and shook his head. "I need to gain some control over myself." I pouted, but he kept my hands from reaching for him, pulling me into a hug as the water ran down over us.

 

* * *

Steve's POV

Sarah must have been more tired than she realized, because next thing I knew, her muscles were relaxing under my hands and a glance showed her eyes were closed. I shook her lightly and she cracked her eyes open briefly.

"You better get out before you fall asleep standing up, doll."

She smiled slightly and I let go of her, steering her to the back of the shower so she could get out. I heard her drying off as I turned the water a little bit cooler, trying not to think of her for a couple minutes until my hard on was gone. She was already back in bed and fast asleep when I came into the bedroom. She blinked up at me sleepily when my weight dipped the bed, closing them again as I moved her, pulling her into my arms and settling her head on my shoulder. I kissed her forehead and covered the small hand resting over my heart.

I smiled into the darkness as I thought about her. She made me so incredibly happy - I almost didn't remember how empty my life had been before she came into it. I don't know how I managed to get lucky enough to find her just when I'd needed her the most. 

I'd heard people talk about soulmates and I finally understood what they'd been talking about. When I was with her, it was like I was finally whole. I no longer questioned my purpose in this time and I now knew those 67 years I'd spent frozen were no longer the punishment I originally thought they were - those years had been necessary for her to be ready for me. 

"I love you," I whispered, kissing her temple. I knew she couldn't hear me, but I needed to say it out loud just the same. I closed my eyes and breathed in her scent, slipping dreamlessly to sleep.

The bright sunshine woke me later that morning. I closed my eyes again, savoring the feel of her soft, warm skin on mine, her firm breasts pressed to my chest as she laid bonelessly sprawled out over me, her breath tickling my neck. I brushed back her long auburn hair, taming it slightly so it wasn't everywhere like it always wanted to be. She jumped when her phone rang, startling her awake. She rolled over and grabbed it, answering it without looking to see who it was.

"Morning, Mom. Yes, we can meet you for breakfast at Tony's. What time is it?" She let out a quiet sigh, laying her head back down on my chest. "What are you doing up this early? Church isn't until 10." She smiled up at me as I stroked her hair. "See you in an hour, then. I'm not sure if Steve is up yet either. Mhhmm. Bye, Mom."

She pushed end and tossed her phone back on the nightstand. "Sorry Steve. Did I wake you?"

"No, I was just waiting for you to wake up. So breakfast and then church this morning?"

"Yup. Is that okay with you?"

"Of course. Are they heading home after church?"

"Probably. Jace leaves for Ops tomorrow." Sarah said with a yawn. "I suppose I'd better get up now if I'm going to be ready in a half hour."

"In a couple minutes," I said with a smile. "I haven't gotten to kiss you good morning yet."

"Hmm. Can't forget that. Most important part of the day," she said with a smile, making herself comfortable on me again and leaning down to kiss me. "Good morning, Steve."

"Good morning, doll." I captured her lips and teased her tongue with mine until we were breathless. "You better go now, or we aren't getting up any time soon."

"You promise?" she said, kissing my neck and working her way down my torso, her objective suddenly apparent to me.

"No," I backpedaled. "We've got places to go and people to see today, so as much as I regret saying this, we have to get up now." I pulled her back up to me for one last kiss before setting her on her feet next to the bed.

It was a good excuse, but it wasn't the only excuse. I wouldn't last more than a moment if she took me into her mouth, not right now, as turned on as I was already.

Sarah pouted for a bit, crossing her arms under her breasts and pushing them up and together. Her pout changed to a smirk as she saw me watching her. Licking her lower lip, she turned and sashaying her pert derrière over to her sweater and pulled it on. I closed my eyes and groaned, getting even harder just knowing she didn't have a single stitch on under that sweater as she walked out the door. This woman was going to be the death of me, I thought, climbing out of bed and heading to the shower. But what a way to go, a small part of my mind agreed.


	26. Mission: South America

Late July 2012   
Sarah's POV

I looked over the table to where Natasha was sitting with Clint. "So let me get this clear – for my cover, I have to pretend to be Clint's girlfriend." I wasn't really excited about this new cover and I could tell Clint wasn't either. "Why aren't you going on this one, Nat?"

"There's a good chance that I'll be recognized by some of the other players coming in for this sale and a couple of my previous covers will...clash...with this one. We've already thought all of this through and it's got to be either you or Maria and she said no."

"I would to have loved to hear that conversation," said Clint with a grin. "I can't really see Maria being able to stay in character for that long any more." 

"You know as well as I do that she's not temperamentally suited to these kinds of covert ops since being stuck in management. Remember Peru?" Natasha sat back and crossed her arms. Clint nodded and groaned, so I assumed it wasn't good. 

"What happened in Peru?" I asked curiously.

"A couple years back, some shithead decided that Maria needed to be his and wouldn't take no for an answer. Pissed her off so much she blew our covers, leading to a hot evac."

"Oh." I considered that for a moment and thought the plan through from the outside. After a minute or two I asked, "So I just have to be convincing enough that I adore him that these arms dealers won't question our relationship?"

"That's the gist of it," said Natasha, studying me. "You might need to be somewhat physically demonstrative with him, kissing, touching, sitting on his lap, sleeping with him..."

I shot her a look, folding my arms over my chest. "You know I'm still a virgin, right? I'm all right with a majority of that stuff, just not actual sex." 

Clint flushed and gaped at me before turning to an amused Natasha. "Seriously! Can't she just be my sister or something?" Clint griped, clearly as ill at ease with this as I was.

"You want those dickwads to hit on her and watch her every move because there's no one with a solid claim on her? Because otherwise that's what's going to happen," said Natasha. "Plus, there's too much of an age difference for her to be your sister."

"There's too much of an age difference for her to be my girlfriend!" Clint folded his arms over his chest and leaned back in his chair, clearly not buying in on this mission.

"Not for these guys and you know it, so quit bitching. They like them young and hot, intelligence negligible. She's got the right coloring and looks like a model. She'll have to dumb down her speech, but that's about it. We need her tech skills there to give us a way in and they won't think she's a threat. They are off the grid enough that it would take too long to try and get in from the outside even if we could lock on your physical location."

"She's right, Clint." I said, crossing my arms and tucking my hair back out of my way again. "We've been looking for the Ten Rings' IP's and satlinks for the past month. Without being there, I won't be able to open the window for Shield or build in a back door for Skye. She can't find a way in either; if it could be done that way, we wouldn't be having this conversation now." 

"Look, if you won't do it, Clint, I'll have to bring in another Agent to be her partner and get her on site. Someone who speaks colloquial Spanish and Portuguese, knows weapons like the back of his hand and looks like a mercenary. There are other options; you know as well as I do that the Ronin alias isn't tied to you specifically."

"Who's the other option?" I asked, mostly out of curiosity. 

Natasha hesitated before finally giving us a name. "Brock Rumlow from Strike 1."

Clint looked at me for a long moment, then back at Natasha. "Does he know about this already?"

"Not until he has to. You're our first choice, Clint." Natasha leaned back in her chair and put her feet on the table, settling in for our inquisition. I could tell she'd made up her mind and wasn't going to leave until we came around to her way of thinking.

"Who is our? You and Steve or Nick and Maria?" he asked, watching her closely.

"Nick, Maria and I. Steve is incommunicato for another couple days at the very least, and we need to get moving soon. Sarah, what's your opinion?"

I really disliked Brock Rumlow and had ever since I had first met him. There were very few people that I couldn't stand, and he was one of them. "Clint, I would much rather it be you than Rumlow." I said, speaking up. "I can't make this believable with him. I don't like him, I don't trust him, and I sure as hell don't want to have to touch him," I shuddered. "Something about him makes my skin crawl."

"That makes two of us. No way in hell am I letting him put his mitts on Cap's girl. Not saying that I want to either, but I know what's expected, at least," Clint stated, meeting my eyes. I squirmed, already uncomfortable with this mission.

"It's a mission. You do what you have to to get the job done – whether you like it or not – and come home in one piece," I said, repeating something I told myself every time I signed on for something that was a little outside my comfort zone. 

I knew that in order to get the information we needed, sometimes I had to play parts that were less than appealing to me personally. This was more than a little out of my comfort zone, this was a lot out of my comfort zone, and I just wasn't sure I could do it this time.

"What kind of Ten Rings weapons deal are we talking?" asked Clint, back to the matter at hand. "Black market or international smuggling?" I looked at them curiously, not knowing much about this mission for once.

"We've received confirmation that a large scale Ten Rings acquisition is in the works in Brazil. Someone is selling stolen Stark tech to them and we need to plug that leak yesterday. We aren't sure, but it looks like the components for their remote controlled bombs like the one in Jahra. There are other agents that will go in with you, but we need people we trust to take in the dummy goods. Only a few of us know that they're all dummies. Tony said they'd pass any checks they would think to do on them, but they're duds."

"Who else is in?" Clint asked. "This is more than a single team op and we'll need to have our own show of force to make this believable."

"Tripp, Hunter, Bobbi, and Grant Ward are already on board for this one. Clint, you're point with Sarah as your Second. Strike teams 1 & 2 are your 'hired muscle' and guards, they've played that role often enough. The Shield outpost in Bogota is on deck if need be. Brazil's Federal Police will be on standby by the time of the exchange. They won't be informed until absolutely necessary, of course."

"16 is a good number. Not too many, not too few. Of course, they won't count Bobbi and Sarah as a threat." Clint rested his hand on the back of his neck, leaning back in his chair.

"They're probably the biggest threat, but those neanderthals still think that because they have boobs they don't have brains." Natasha had clearly used that to her advantage before; I know I had. I made a decision and hoped I wasn't going to regret it.

"I take it I'm going to like Bobbi just fine," I said as I grinned at Natasha.

"Yup." She nodded with a smirk. "She's a great Agent; loves doing this kind of stuff and is solidly loyal to Shield."

"This is probably the largest undercover op I've been a part of. I'm going to go pack since I'm assuming we leave soon."

"Already done. You leave in an hour, and Maria will brief you via satlink on the way. I went shopping for you since I doubted that you had the right kind of wardrobe already. Everything is laundered and packed."

"Nat! You take all the fun out of things! I was just starting to look forward to that part." I whined half-heartedly, secretly glad that my wardrobe was taken care of. I knew I probably wasn't going to want to wear half of it, but it would make me look my part.

"Clint's all packed too. He already had everything he needed, I just had to get it all together."

"Thanks, Nat." He leaned over and gave her a peck on the cheek. "See you in a week or two."

"Thanks, Nat," I echoed. "Fill Steve in when he gets back so he doesn't worry when he can't reach me. I'll leave him a video message for you to forward to him."

"Will do. Bruce said he'd help babysit him to keep him from coming after you."

"As Bruce or as the Hulk?" I asked, staring at her.

"Whichever one is needed. Tony said he'd help, too."

"Good. I'll meet you on the roof in an hour, then." 

I left the conference room so I could go make a short video message for Steve, get something to eat and call my mom. Plus I needed a little bit of time to figure out how I was supposed to act before boarding the plane. As if on cue, a file arrived from Natasha. I tapped on it to start it downloading as I walked to my office. When it finished, I leaned back in my chair and opened it. 

It was a good thing I was sitting down; I was so shocked at what I read that I almost fell out of my chair. Natasha had basically sent me a sex primer so I would know what Clint - her boyfriend - liked. I glanced through it, shaking my head at her reasoning. We would be spending the rest of the week under hostile observation, so from her viewpoint, it all made sense; I wasn't sure I could do any of that with him.

Once we got in the air, we had a couple hours before we touched down at the private airstrip where we were meeting the rest of the team that was going with us. I determined that I needed to have a frank conversation with Clint that established the basics of our faux relationship. 

Tripp and Ryan were flying the Quinjet, so I blocked our coms from theirs so we could have a private conversation. I gestured toward the back of the jet, to the small alcove out of sight from the pilot's seats. Clint followed me, openly curious as to what I didn't want the others to hear.

"Look, Clint, I need to understand what you need me to do," I said bluntly. "I don't really know what you're expecting of me."

He studied me for a long moment. "I suppose you wouldn't have played this kind of part before - I need you to act like you adore me, like I'm the love of your life. Are you okay with me touching you while you sit on my lap?" 

I looked at him with wide eyes. I cleared my throat. "Depends - do you mean like putting your arm around me...or more than that?" He only gave me a look, which was an answer in itself. "Great. So more?"

"Sarah, I need to make it crystal clear to the men we're meeting with that you belong to me in every way possible."

I took a deep breath, closing my eyes for a moment before looking back at him. "I think I can do that," I said doubtfully. 

"We're also going to be sharing a room and a bed while we're on site. If you can show me the angle of the cameras in our rooms, I'll make everything look real without doing anything more than necessary. The biggest thing is going to be making it sound real."

I looked at him with alarm, my breaths becoming shallow as I kind of understood what he was getting at. "Umm, okay. The cameras and any bugs I can handle, it's the rest I'm... well... umm... nervous... about, I guess. I'm sorry, Clint, I'm a little out of my depth here."

"All right, let's back up for a moment. Come here." He tugged on my hand and I let him pull me onto his lap, where I sat stiffly, looking at him warily. "We have a little bit of time for you to get used to me before we get there. Okay?"

"Okay," I agreed reluctantly.

"If it helps you, just pretend I'm Steve and react like you would to him."

"You don't mind?"

"Not at all - whatever makes this easier for you. Think about how you'd sit with him."

I forced myself to relax into him. He didn't feel like Steve or smell like Steve, either."

Clint waited until I was breathing easily again. "Now how would you touch him or kiss him?" 

He stroked his hand down my face, bringing a finger under my chin and bringing his lips to mine, slowly enough that I could stop him if I needed to. His hands ran down my arms and up my back as he gradually deepened the kiss, drawing me out of my shell. He was a really good kisser, I determined. Little bit by little bit I relaxed into him, allowing him to pull me closer.

"That was good," he said quietly. "Now I want you to touch me, okay?"

I nodded, starting to understand. "Okay." I brought my hands up and placed them on his shoulders, experimenting with what felt natural, running my hands over his arms and torso.

"Now I want you to kiss me, Sarah." I drew back slightly so I could see his face, meeting his eyes, reading his sincerity. "You take the lead this time, okay?"

I finally broke the kiss, resting my head on his shoulder as he wrapped his arms around me in a hug. We stayed that way for a long moment before I eased back from him. He pushed my hair back, tucking it behind my ear.

"I think you got this, honey. What do you think?" Clint asked, smiling at me gently.

I nodded. "I can do this, I think." I reached for his hand and linked my fingers with his, making him smile. "This is different for you, too, isn't it?"

"Yeah. It's been a long time since I've had a different partner. Nat and I have been a team for six years and the seven before that I was either alone or with Maria."

"I have a hard time imagining Maria in the field. I mean, I know she was, I just can't see it."

"She was quite good at it; we worked well together. For the past couple years, she's been Fury's second, and that has made her...different, harder in a way. Your role here was originally hers, you know. We created it when Ronin needed her to blend in and for backup."

"I didn't know that. I just assumed the cover was because of my middle name, so I'd respond instinctively."

"Coincidence. I'm looking forward to seeing how you play this, Sarah. We're almost to the airstrip. Are you ready to meet everyone else?"

I nodded, putting our coms back online and standing up. We were taking one of Tony's unmarked jets that was currently registered to a dummy holding. Bobbi Morse and Lance Hunter were already there, along with Grant Ward and several of the other agents that were going in as our men. 

This whole op rested on Clint and Hunter as the forwards. Clint had an established alias that he had used before, Ronin, a title that was conveniently recognized more by reputation than by any specific Agent. He'd borrowed my short swords since they'd been easy for Nat to grab when she was loading our gear. Hunter kept his name since he was already known by it in the merc communities, and Bobbi was known as his 'Barbie.' Grant and the rest of the guards got to keep their names since they weren't usually undercover agents in this region.

Bobbi took one look at me and told me to grab my bag before she dragged me to a private bedroom on the plane so we could get changed into our working clothes – in my case a micro mini and a crop top, similar to the revealing bodycon dress she was wearing.

"What you have to do on a mission stays with that mission," Bobbi said as she finished her makeup and started on mine. "You have a part to play and you had better be the best goddamn actress I have ever seen or I'll kill you myself if you blow our covers." 

Did I believe her? Yes, yes I did. She was a lot like Natasha, so I found myself relaxing around her. "I won't blow our covers. I think I know what is expected of me other than my tech skills."

"Good. Yeah, it sucks to have to pretend to be brainless eye candy, but at least we don't have to be hookers this time. I really hate being a hooker."

I gawked at her and shook my head. "I don't think I could be a convincing hooker. I'm still a virgin."

"Well, that explains a few things." She looked at me with undeniable amusement. "You won't have to really do it with Clint. There's a lot of other stuff you can do that'll be just as convincing to a listener."

"What kind of stuff?"

"I'm not even sure where to start with that one, kid. You're just going to have to trust Clint and follow his lead. Don't you have any slutty friends?"

"No, but my best friend has dated that kind of girl. I better get a Golden Globe for this performance when we get back."

Bobbi laughed as I mimed holding a statue and taking a bow. "You and me both. I used to be married to Hunter, so at least I know what to expect from him." 

"Wow....umm - sorry?"

"Thanks. So I take it you've got a guy back home?" Bobbi asked, touching up her hair, glancing at me in the mirror. I smiled, thinking about Steve.

"Yeah. Steve's a really nice guy and I like him a lot. We haven't been together very long, though. He's with Shield, so I'm hoping that he understands about this."

"Steve got a face to go with the name?" she asked curiously. 

"Yeah." I tapped my phone and pulled a recent photo up of the two of us. "That's him."

"Oh my God! You're dating the Steve Rogers? No wonder you're still a virgin, then." 

I wasn't sure if that was a compliment or an insult, and she didn't elaborate. I looked at my appearance in the mirror. I almost didn't recognize myself in full, bold makeup with loosely curled hair. My gold hoop earrings glinted against my lightly tanned skin and the gaudy gold cross necklace rested between my breasts, drawing the eye to my much more impressive cleavage, thanks to the push-up bra Nat had bought me. How she had known my sizes, I didn't want to know. I snapped a quick selfie and sent it to Nat before I stuffed my phone into the back pocket of my jean skirt.

"I can see why you were having a hard time getting into character before. I mean, Clint's not bad looking, don't get me wrong - I can appreciate a nice build as much as the next girl – but he's got nothing on America's golden boy."

I wasn't sure how to reply to that, but luckily I don't think she really expected one. I finished putting things back into my bag and zipped it up, leaving it on the bed by Bobbi's and Clint's. Bobbi gave me a final once over, nodding approvingly.

"Showtime, Maria!" Bobbi grinned wickedly, rubbing her hands together like I'd given her a treat. "I can't wait to watch their eyes pop out of their skulls when they see you! Ready? Team meeting time – we'll be landing in a half hour."

I laughed and followed Bobbi – Barbie – out of the bedroom we used to prep in and saw that she was right. Tripp immediately looked away from me and told me to go put more clothes on, which made Barbie laugh. Hunter was too busy staring at Barbie to even notice me, which was good. 

Ward's jaw dropped and I teasingly tapped it back into place as I sauntered my way to Clint – Ronin – who was just as shocked at my appearance. I put my arms around his neck and pulled him down to me, stopping millimeters from kissing him. In my heels, I wasn't that much shorter than him. 

"What do you think, Ronin? Am I good enough for you?"

It took him a long moment to take me in before he gave me a rakish grin and pulled me tight to his side, one arm around me. "Damn, woman. You sure clean up good! I'm going to have my hands full with you, aren't I?"

I giggled and ran a hand down his torso. "I think I'm the one who's going to have my hands full."

He groaned. "It's going to be a long week."

I gave him a look, dropping the act. "I'll do my part if you do yours."

"Agreed. You don't even look like Sarah anymore." He spun me around so he could check out the whole outfit. "Perfect."

"Excellent, because Sarah isn't here, Ronin, Maria is. Ready to run over the final plan now that Barbie and I are here?"

"Sure thing, 'Ria." He turned towards the rest of the group. "Bring it in guys, last call."

Everyone took a seat and Clint took the floor. This was the first time I'd seen him take a lone leadership role. The Avengers had so many solid leaders, he didn't often take point with them, deferring instead to Steve, who was a brilliant tactician.

"I know that you've already all got your specific orders, but I'm going to run through the lineup just so we're all clear." Clint pointed at each of us in turn as he summed up our roles. "I'm Ronin, a mercenary that periodically trades high dollar goods when he gets his hands on something good. In this case, we're the suppliers. Tripp, you're with me as my head bodyguard. Jack, you're his second."

"Thanks for not making me wear a monkey suit," Tripp drawled. 

"De nada," he smirked. He set one hand on my shoulder as he talked about me. "Maria is my latest girlfriend – I expect challenges in regard to her, particularly from the younger players that are supposed to be coming." I saw that the older men were all nodding. I still didn't get it, but I supposed that I would understand shortly. 

"I need Maria in all of our meetings with the Ring as a second set of ears; she fluently speaks all of the languages of the various leaders we anticipate showing," he turned to look directly at me. "I want you, 'Ria, to be listening to the undercurrents."

"Got it," I replied.

"Hunter, you're my associate since your cover is already known in South America as a legit supplier and Barbie is just as well known as your what – girlfriend or wife?"

"Girlfriend with expensive tastes," said Hunter in his British accent with a cheeky grin at Barbie, who didn't deny it, shrugging expressively. 

Clint nodded. "Girlfriend it is. You know what to expect as far as the usual cockfighting goes?" Hunter flipped Clint off as Bobbi just laughed. Clint continued on with the rundown. "Ward and Ryan are your bodyguards. Did you two decide who's head?" 

Ward nodded and said, "I won the toss, Ryan's taking second."

"The rest of Strike teams 1&2 will be arriving with the package whenever we agree on a date and time at the sale. Most of these buyers are known associates of the Ten Rings and think we're supplying them with more bomb parts stolen from Stark's labs. Assume you're being observed at all times and check our lodgings carefully for bugs." 

Clint looked over at me and Barbie. "Ladies, take an escort with you if you wander around the camp, even if it's just to go to the bathroom. You're invaluable to this mission. While I know that you can handle yourselves, I have no wish to take on the white slave trade again – Barbie I'm talking to you!"

She flipped Clint off and punched Hunter as he snickered. I was sure there was a story behind that because the older men all grinned knowingly. I raised my eyebrow at her and she shook her head, mouthing later to me.

"Our goal is to get them to bring in their big wigs so we can take as many of them out as possible. I don't know exactly how many players we're talking yet. The Federales have been tipped off and are going to be trying to round them up as they land in the major ports on drug trafficking charges. Stay smart and stay in character no matter what you see or hear unless Maria tells you she has control of the surveillance. Portuguese or Spanish only from here on out, queda claro?"

Everyone nodded and he took a seat next to me since we were starting our descent. 

"Ready, Ronin?" I took his hand in mine and squeezed it reassuringly.

"Ready, 'Ria. Let's do this."


	27. Hurry Up and Wait

Location Classified   
End of July, 2012  
Steve's POV

This part of my job was always the most boring part, waiting for a spider to crawl out of its hole. I thought about Sarah while I waited, wondering what she was up to right now. I'd gotten a text from Nat saying that Sarah and Clint were heading to South America today to infiltrate a Ten Rings black market arms base there. I sighed mentally, knowing that meant I wouldn't get to see her for the rest of the week, even if we somehow managed to finish this mission ahead of schedule. 

It'd been slow going, hunting down all these Hydra bases. They were scattered all over the world and it seemed like there were more popping up all the time. It was more than a little frustrating to me, knowing that when I'd went in the ice we'd just taken the last known Hydra base, only to wake up in this time to find it still operating - even more widespread than before.

My relief came by and took over my post, leaving me with a couple hours of downtime before my next watch. I walked over to the small clearing we were using as a camp and rolled myself in a blanket to get a little sleep while I could. Chances were nothing was going to happen yet today; someone would wake me if it did. I closed my eyes, willing myself to sleep.

I woke up to someone shaking me awake, telling me it was my watch again. It was the last hour before dawn and after getting a bite to eat, I walked over to take over for Jake.

"See anything interesting?"

"Nope, not a damn thing. It's making us all edgy, this waiting."

"I know, Jake. Go get some sleep while it's still dark. We might have to make the first move at this rate."

Jake clapped me on the shoulder as he passed, a token acknowledgment. I still didn't see any signs of movement, but we were going to have to slip our way in if nothing happened by dawn. It was too risky, staying in the open like we were right now. I was just glad that I hadn't been saddled with Rumlow on this assignment. If he made one more off color remark about Sarah, Maria or Natasha, I was going to kill him myself.

Instead, I'd been allowed to pick my own crew from the the Strike and Tactical teams currently at the Triskelion. I had worked with all of these guys before, so I knew who I wanted for this mission. Most of the men I picked were decent guys with excellent skills, most ex-Military of some kind. 

Sarah had approved all of them after meeting them, so that made me feel better. She was a great judge of character and I knew by watching them interact with her and Nat if they were who I thought they were or not. None of them could beat her in hand to hand combat, and all of them had taken being beaten by a woman fairly well... other than most of them tried to ask her out - until they found out she was my girlfriend.

I signaled to the other guard that I was going to go scout ahead for a bit and he nodded, strolling between the two stations to cover both while I went to go check out the fortifications of the base we were supposed to be taking while it was still dark enough I wouldn't be seen.

This mission was a little harder because we needed to take the base without destroying it. Once we were in, we were supposed to do something with the computers. I didn't understand how it worked exactly, just that it would give us a way to remotely access Hydra's files. Sarah's hacker friend Skye had given me the piece just before I'd left the Triskelion. 

A motion behind me had me turning and grabbing the unfamiliar figure, slamming the person to the ground, knocking the wind out of their lungs and pinning them down with my hand around their neck. I pulled off the person's hood to see that it was a woman that I knew well. I let go of her and she sat up, quietly getting her breath back.

"Agent May," I said quietly, "I could've seriously harmed you; you know better than to sneak up on me."

"Sorry Captain," she said, looking around. "I just got here and needed to talk to you alone."

"Not that I'm not always glad to see you, Agent May, but what're you doing here? I thought you were on standby for extraction?"

"We were," she explained with a slight grimace. "But there's been a slight complication. Do you trust your men, Captain?"

I looked at her evenly. "Yes, every man with me was handpicked and vetted by both Natasha and Sarah."

"Good," she said firmly. "They wouldn't have chosen anyone they didn't trust."

"No, they wouldn't," I agreed, my curiosity getting the best of me. "What's this all about, Agent May?"

The small Asian woman reached into her coat to pull out a tablet. She tapped at it a couple times and handed it to me to look at. I gestured for her to follow me and we headed back to camp, May staying by my side and talking quietly.

"Skye picked up some specific intel about this base and Director Fury sent me in to help you out." 

I skimmed through the information quickly, realizing that this would change my objective radically. I raised my eyebrows at her; she knew I was capable of doing a lot on my own. 

"Not like that, Rogers," she said with a slight curve of her lips that could almost be called a smile...almost. "While fighting with you can be quite entertaining, I'm only here as your tech expert. Romanoff's on a solo mission, Skye's not ready for this kind of field duty yet - and I needed to get off the bus for a while."

"That makes more sense. I have the piece Skye gave me, though."

"Get rid of it. Based off this information," she pointed at the tablet, "she now thinks it would have triggered a self destruct virus throughout the mainframe, making this place a waste of time."

"So they're either paranoid or this was a trap."

"My money's on trap. What was your plan, out of curiosity?"

"Basically, Fitzsimmons knockout gas in the ventilation system, roundup and contain until cleanup squad gets here, do Skye's errand."

"It was a good plan," May said, nodding decisively. "Their latest version of the gas would buy you at least an hour. What are you going to do now?" 

I handed her back the tablet and she tucked it away. "Finish having a look around. You can come with if you like, Agent May. I wouldn't mind hearing your opinions on this place."

"I thought you'd never ask." May cracked her knuckles and followed me silently through the trees.

 

* * *  
Brazil  
Sarah's POV 

When the plane stopped and a rolling staircase was brought to the door, we descended. Tripp went first, scoping things out before the rest of us disembarked. I clung to Clint's arm and walked beside him, pointing things out eagerly. Hunter escorted Bobbi out and Ward brought up the rear. 

There were cars waiting for us with native drivers and Bobbi, Clint, Hunter and I got in while Tripp and Ward made sure all of our luggage made it off the plane. After a short drive, we arrived at the terrorist camp. It was an old military base that had fallen into ruin and a tent city had sprung up around it. We drove past it and right through the gates. 

The vehicles stopped in front of a large villa that looked like it had seen better days. Inside was much nicer than I expected, with brightly colored walls and opulent furnishings. Our suites were adjoining, with a small room for our guards to use when they weren't needed, which was quite convenient for our purposes. Tripp, Ward and the other guards sat our bags down for us and the guide said that he would be back after siesta to take us to Vidente. 

Tripp and Ward searched for bugs and cameras, finding and disconnecting several. Clint did a quick sweep after they were finished and found one more in each room while I tapped into their signal, making it look like I was just playing with my phone and had any remaining bugs chirp at me, locating several more. 

"Ronin – come try this bed out. It feels great!" I said as I flung myself onto the large king bed.

He laughed at the sight of me sprawled out on the huge bed. He waited until Ward had left before jumped up on it, surprising a squeak out of me as I bounced in the air. He caged me in his arms and laid my head on his chest.

"You're right, 'Ria. It does feel great - very comfortable."

He made a motion with his hand and Tripp closed the door on his way out. Clint rolled us, raised himself up on his forearms and leaned over me, leaning in to kiss me. His weight was enough to sink me into the bed, but he wasn't as heavy as Steve, so he wasn't crushing me. 

His lips were gentle as they covered mine - more coaxing than demanding. I got the hang of his pattern quickly and then he deepened the kiss, coaxing me to open my mouth and teasing my tongue with his. As I brought my hands up to tangle in his hair and ran them lightly over his back and sides, I couldn't help but feel the physical difference between him and Steve. 

Clint nipped at my lower lip before working down my neck and back up to my ear. He sucked on my earlobe leisurely before returning to my lips. I heard the outside door open and then steady footsteps approaching the bedroom door. Clint broke the kiss and spoke clearly when the door opened.

"I thought I said we weren't to be disturbed," he said coldly. 

I looked briefly at Tripp, who hesitated for a moment before speaking. "My apologies, sir. You asked me to inform you immediately when the guide was here to take you to this Vidente."

"Leave us. We'll be out in a minute." 

Clint rolled off of me and tucked his swords back into their scabbards and strapped them on. I went into the bathroom so I could check my make up and tidy my hair. My lips were slightly kiss-swollen, but there was nothing I could do about that. I had the feeling that this was how Clint had wanted me to look when we met Vidente.

Tripp, Clint and I stepped into the hallway and a moment later Ward, Hunter and Bobbi joined us. Hunter's hair was disheveled and Bobbi's lips were slightly swollen as well. I guess I was doing okay at playing my part because the look she gave me was approving. 

The leader at this base turned out to be a well built man in his late thirties with black hair and dark brown eyes. He wore light body armor and I could see the faded scars on his arms, neck and face that indicated he had spent time as a mercenary when he was younger. He was sitting at a large table playing cards and drinking, a beautiful blond woman on his lap. He said something to her and she got up so he could stand to meet Clint and Hunter. He ran an appreciative eye over Bobbi and I and we gave him polite, uninterested smiles. 

"Welcome comrades. I am Vidente, I am pleased that you could make it on such short notice. Ronin, your reputation precedes you." 

He held out a hand to Clint, who grasped it briefly. Vidente turned to me, intending to greet me when instantly one of Clint's swords was resting at his neck, hovering just above the skin. 

"Good. Then you will know that what's mine will stay mine or I'll carve pieces off anyone who lays a hand on my Maria." Clint ran a hand down the side of my face and I smiled up at him adoringly, leaning into the caress.

"Duly noted." Vidente stepped back and Clint slowly lowered the blade, waiting a moment before resheathing his sword. "Diego will make sure my men are informed." He nodded to a large man who stood off to his side and slightly behind him. "A pleasure to meet you, Maria. I hope you enjoy your time here."

"Thank you, Senor Vidente." I looked up at him through my eyelashes with a smile and he turned to the others in our group.

"Hunter, it has been too long! I thought you had left the game?" Hunter clasped hands with Vidente, pulling him into a one-armed hug.

"Just temporarily." He slapped the other man on the back. "Things are a little too crowded in Europe right now and my Barbie wanted to do some traveling. She can be quite persuasive when she wants to be." Hunter winked, laughing as he pinched Bobbi's ass. 

Vidente nodded in acknowledgment to Bobbi, who flashed him a bright smile. "And this is my Nadia." Bobbi was closer to Nadia, so she air kissed the other blond in typical Brazilian greeting and I stepped forward to do the same. 

Vidente gestured toward the table and we took seats, Clint pulling me onto his lap and Bobbi poured us drinks before she settled next to Hunter. I sniffed at mine before taking a sip of the amber liquor; it was a sweet rum with a hint of molasses. It was quite good, and I took a larger drink, savoring the flavor.

"So where's Sahib?" asked Hunter, picking up his glass. "I figured he'd beat us here since we had to make a little detour to meet up with Ronin in the States to check out the goods."

"Sadly, Sahib himself will not be joining us. His...other activities... made Cesar quite angry at him the last time he was here. Therefore Cesar's cousin with the Federal's made sure Sahib was taken into custody when he arrived in Rio yesterday. I understand his oldest son has taken over and will be flying in tomorrow sometime, as will most of the rest of the bidders. They have until Thursday to show up if they want in."

"I'd heard that there was bad blood between Sahib and Cesar, so I guess I'm not surprised that he managed to get his revenge on Sahib for poaching on his territory." Hunter took a long drink of his rum and smacked his lips appreciatively. "Caesar's wife must be beyond reproach, after all."

"His response to Sahib's being taken into custody was, 'I don't care if they respect me so long as they fear me,' according to my sources," Vidente laughed.

"Experience is the teacher of all things," quoted Hunter with a mocking grin. I glanced at him in surprise - I didn't know he was such a fan of the classics. "Next time Sahib will stay out of Cesar's drugs and away from his wife."

"So the son, what is he like? I haven't dealt with Sahib in quite some time, but he always delivered," asked Clint, taking the glass from my hand and taking a drink.

"Talib has come here before several times while standing in for his father. While he is much more quick tempered than Sahib, he has quite the following of his own already. In my opinion, it was only a matter of time before he took over for his sire." Vidente smiled as Nadia came back over to sit on his lap with a fresh deck of cards and his drink. "Poker? I'm sure you are better partners than my guards." 

Clint, Bobbi and Hunter nodded, clearly intending to to visit, smoke and gamble for a while to lull Vidente into confidence. He and Hunter had a cautious working relationship, but Clint needed to get a read on him yet and Vidente didn't know Ronin other than by reputation, which I gathered was respected in the merc communities. 

I shook my head and smiled regretfully, leaning into Clint. "I don't know the game well enough yet, Senor." 

His woman whispered something in his ear and he returned my smile with a laugh, "Watch and learn, little Maria. Poker is a skill, not just a game." He started dealing the cards to the others.

Clint looked up at me and smiled before turning his attention to Vidente. "My time with her is not spent playing cards."

Vidente laughed. "I imagine not. Whatever happened to your redhead, Ronin? I was hoping to meet her; I hear that she is quite beautiful."

"Natalia? Yes, she is very beautiful – and quite fiery tempered. She is also not pleased with me since I have taken up with my 'Ria." He put a finger under my chin and pulled me down to kiss him. I stroked his face, clearly thinking the world of him. "It was safer for all of us for me to bring 'Ria." He grinned at Vidente, who chortled gleefully.

"Oh-ho! You like to play with fire, then. My Nadia, jewel that she is, does not like it when I stray either. But what can I say, I appreciate beautiful women – and they appreciate me."

The men raised their glasses while I shared a look with Nadia. She clearly thought I was beneath her, but there was something else in her face that took me a moment to place before it was gone again. Envy – for the gentle way Clint treated me. Vidente must be a difficult man to stay with, judging by the various bruises that she sported in different stages of healing revealed by her skimpy halter top and skirt. I pushed my hair back and shifted so Clint could put his arm around me to pick up his cards and see them.

"I know better than to look at other women. Barbie will have my balls if I do," Hunter chimed in with a smirk as he arranged his cards.

"I already have your balls, Hunter, among other things." She flashed her hand, showing off an expensive, large, diamond ring.

"Yes, you do, darling. And I wouldn't have it any other way." He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it, meeting her eyes.

I watched the men play cards for a while before I determined that nothing important was going to be learned today. At the next shuffle, I leaned down to murmur in Clint's ear, "I'm going to take a walk for a bit. Get Nadia to show me around."

"All right," he murmured as he kissed me briefly. "Take Tripp with you."

"Senor Vidente, may Nadia show me around so I don't get lost? I would like to freshen up before dinner."

"Of course, Maria. Dinner is at 8 in the main dining room. Nadia will show you the way."

"Thank you, Senor." I got off Clint's lap after another brief kiss. I signaled Tripp and he nodded, sharing a look with Ward before falling in behind me. I had Nadia show me to the ladies room and she fixed her hair while I used the bathroom. I came out to wash my hands and got a good look at the bruises on the back of her neck. I moved her hair again to look at it, meeting her eyes in the mirror.

"Oh! Are you okay? That looks bad, Nadia!"

"It will be fine. It was my fault for not pleasing Vidente." She fluffed her hair back around her shoulders and turned to face me. 

"I'm sorry. Is he always..."

"No! Most of the time he is fine, but when others anger him, he gets a little rough until I can calm him down. It is what it is. Ronin is not the same?"

"No, not with me; not yet, at least. If a man angers him, he takes it out on the man; he has never intentionally struck me. Have you been with him long?"

"Since I was 16. He was driving through my village when I caught his eye. I knew who he was even then; he is not a man used to the word 'no'. He gave me enough time to gather my things and tell my Mami I was going with him. She understood that it was either I went with him or he would have my family killed." 

She shrugged matter-of-factly. Her story was quite common in this part of the world. Powerful men did what they wanted, took what they wanted with no consequences; Vidente was one of the larger players in Brazil.

"How old are you now?"

"19. I am lucky that I have managed to keep him interested in me for this long. Most of the other leaders have a different woman every time and don't treat them nearly as well as Vidente usually treats me."

"I've noticed this as well even though I'm new to this game. I've only been with Ronin for a couple months now, since I turned 18. He saw me at my family's restaurant and paid them well for me to go with him. He's my first...protector...I guess you could say."

We turned to go out of the bathroom and I linked arms with her as we wandered around the base. She pointed out the areas we would most likely be in during the next couple days and I filled out the map in my head, noting guards and cameras. We made small talk as we wandered, Nadia seemed to like me and we chattered like normal teenage girls. Many of the men we met stepping to the walls away from us as we passed. 

"Why do they do that?" I asked her after we passed another group that had swiftly parted and stood against the wall, watching us pass with greedy eyes that made my flesh crawl.

"Vidente does not like me being touched by other men. They are all under orders to never lay a hand on me in any way."

"Wow. And I though Ronin was the only one like that!" I looked at her with a smile, indicating Tripp.

She just laughed. "I can't believe he pulled a sword on Vidente so fast. Usually the stories I hear of these men are greatly exaggerated and I am disappointed when I meet them in person. It would seem the stories I've heard of Ronin are mostly true." She showed me to her room so she could get ready for dinner. I gestured for Tripp to stay outside the door.

"I wouldn't know. No one has ever mentioned them to me."

"Like they would! I'm sure you are not allowed to talk to unfamiliar men either."

"True, and I've yet to see the same women twice."

"So you have not meet Barbie before either? She is very beautiful and I think she has been with Hunter for quite a while now."

"No, I don't travel with Vidente when he goes to Europe. He says that way he doesn't have to worry about how I will manage there."

"Do you speak other languages? Like English?"

"I speak a little English. Do you?"

"Yes, my village got a fair amount of tourism, so I had to learn some. Would you like to practice your English with me?"

"Yes, while I get ready. Vidente likes me to dress up for dinner when we have guests. I'll show you back to your room after I'm ready."

"Great. Do you want help with your hair? I just learned how to do a new braid from a video and wanted to try it out. It'll look lovely with your light hair. It's too hard to see it in mine since it's so dark."


	28. What Did You Have In Mind?

Sarah's POV 

"Do you remember how to get to the dining room?" Nadia asked, turning to go.

"Yes, see you soon." 

Clint met Nadia leaving our rooms. He smiled when he saw me all dressed up. "You look very beautiful, my dear." He pulled me into his arms and kissed me lightly before letting me go. "I'll change and then we can go to dinner. Did you and Nadia have a good time?"

I went into the closet to get out his suit while he stripped, not ready to see him naked. I switched back to Portuguese. "We did - it was nice to have a little girl talk. We were practicing our English, too."

"So I heard. You're getting better at it."

"Did you win at poker?" I asked, handing him his shirt first and then his pants. 

He smiled at me as he did up the fasteners. "Some. Hunter is a better player." He quickly dressed and turned to me to tie his necktie. "You didn't miss much, just a lot of bragging by Hunter and our host - mostly Hunter."

"Good to know," I said, smiling at him.

Vidente was certainly trying to show off to us. A large table was covered with a pristine white tablecloth and set for the six of us. All of the men wore suits, which was interesting considering it was at least 100 degrees still. 

The men continued drinking their spirits and I hoped Clint and Hunter had hard heads for the amount of liquor they were consuming. There was also wine from a nearby vineyard that Vidente owned for his own private stock. It was a refreshing change for my palate and it went well with the meal. Our glasses were filled often, and I drank a fair amount in an attempt to settle my nerves.

Following the meal, the servants showed in another player. Khan was his codename and it wasn't lost on me that all of the larger players had names that translated to 'ruler' in various languages. The only exception was our host, Vidente, whose name meant Prophet.

Khan was a handsome, Middle Eastern man who was sufficiently westernized to not openly gawk at us in our form fitting evening gowns. He was younger than I expected, closer to my age than Clint's - probably in his early twenties, with dark hair and olive skin; he was well dressed in the manner of a rich man's son, his clothes well tailored. 

Khan would bear watching if he was ruthless enough to rise to the head of his region as quickly as he had. Based on his accent, I would have said he came from Riyadh, but I didn't hear anything in his words to confirm that.

While Khan only glanced over both Bobbi and Nadia appreciatively, his eyes focused on me more than I liked to see. I'd have thought he would prefer blondes, but that apparently wasn't the case. Hunter was openly amused, Vidente watched with interest. Clint noticed it as well and his hand twitched like he was going to reach for his concealed pistol more than once. I ignored the princeling and instead focused my attention on Clint, hoping Khan would take a hint and cease watching me in a way that would get him shot sooner rather than later. 

Based on the information that Shield had given us, it wasn't difficult to believe that all of these rulers were regional leaders of the Ten Rings; it made sense given the global scope of the organization. 

With at least three of them coming to this meeting, I hoped to be able to enable the trackers built into the dummy parts to be able to locate each of their bases. It was going to be difficult to do while under I was observation, and there were cameras everywhere, including the bathrooms.

* * 

After we retired to our rooms, I showered and wrapped the towel around me to dig through my suitcase to find some pajamas. Since Natasha had packed, I wasn't sure what they looked like - but I was certain they didn't resemble my comfy tank tops and shorts I wore back home. I made a frustrated noise and gave up, much to Clint's amusement when he came in from Hunter's room.

"Looking for something, 'Ria?" He came up behind me and kissed my shoulder, working up to my neck.

I sighed. "I can't find my nightie. I'm sure I set one out to pack, but since Natalia helped, I can't be certain which one got packed – or if she packed it at all. You know how she can be sometimes." I turned to him, pouting. He nipped my out-thrust lip before giving me a peck.

"Then it's probably silky and went all the way to the bottom of the bag. That's what happens with that kind of fabric in a bag that size. Why don't you take everything out just to be sure." 

He walked into the bathroom to take his own shower, leaving me in peace to dig through everything. I upended the bag on our bed, hanging up everything that needed it and putting my bras and underwear in a dresser drawer.

I looked at the remaining items on the bed; there wasn't anything even close to resembling a nightie, only a couple matching sets made up of silky opaque thongs and a halter top. A light bulb went off and I suddenly realized that those were my nighties. I briefly considered knocking on the adjoining door to ask Bobbi if she had one I could borrow, but she'd probably just laugh, so I picked the black set and shoved the rest in the drawer with my underwear. 

I put them on, feeling incredibly exposed. I quickly slid under the covers; I wasn't quite ready to display myself to Clint. As I pulled the covers up, I wondered if Steve would like them. They seemed more like they were intended as a male visual stimulus since they really weren't all that comfortable. 

I settled into the huge, comfy bed and curled up on my side, closing my eyes and waiting for Clint to finish in the shower. I must have drifted off, because I woke suddenly when the bed dipped, rolling me onto my back. I sat up, startled awake by the movement and heard a masculine chuckle next to me. The room was completely dark, so it took my eyes a moment to adjust before I could see Clint sitting next to me in bed. 

"Did I scare you, 'Ria?"

"Surprised me. I must have fallen asleep while you were in the shower. Did you run the base out of hot water?"

"Hah, no." I heard the laughter in his voice and saw a flash of white teeth. "Come here so I can get comfortable." He laid down and pulled me over to him, settling me in his arms.

"So I found something to wear to bed, but Natalia must have been shopping because this isn't what I'd picked out."

"It never is. I'm assuming I'll like it just fine if she picked it out."

I waited for him to lay down and then laid my head on his shoulder. "Probably. She never ceases to surprise me."

"Join the club." He took my hand in his under the covers and tapped Morse code into it.

:R u ok with this?:

:Yes. How did I do?:

:Good. R u ready 2 act? U need 2 b loud and vocal.:

:I'm nervous.:

:Don't think - relax - respond.: 

The entire conversation didn't take very long and he held me for a little while longer before pulling me up on top of him. I laid my head on his broad chest and listened to his heartbeat. It was a little quicker than normal, but mine was as well. I felt sorry for the other members of our team for being forced to listen to us and mentally cringed at the thought of facing them in the morning.

"I saw the way Khan looked at you tonight, 'Ria?"

"That's not my fault," I whined. "I swear I didn't encourage him, Ronin."

"You better not have been flirting with him. Who do you belong to?"

"You. I belong to you, Ronin."

"Prove it," he ordered as he moved my legs apart to straddle his hips, trapping his hard cock between us. He ran his hands up and down my back, feeling where my clothes ended and my skin began. "Mmm. As much I usually prefer to have you naked, I do like these, babydoll." 

"Glad you like them, sir," I said, wriggling as I tried to get comfortable, drawing a groan from Clint. 

"Behave," he growled, smacking my ass lightly with his hand. There was a lot of noise for not very much contact. "Or do you need to be disciplined already?"

"I'll be good, sir," I said breathily, playing my part. "I promise."

* *

Following our performance, I let Clint carry me to the bathroom, my arms around his neck and my legs around his waist. He set me down on my feet to turn on the shower and we got in, soaping up and rinsing off quickly.

'Are you okay?' Clint signed once the bathroom was steamed up. My eyes widened, realizing I could actually talk to him. 'That wasn't too much for you?'

'I'm okay, a little surprised, but okay. We hadn't done anything I feel ashamed of - but I think I'm still in shock.'

'You did good. What do you think of our host?'

'He's abusive to Nadia,' I replied. 'I think he's looking forward to Cesar and Talib meeting tomorrow. He likes drama.'

'What about Khan?'

'He bears watching - so young to have that rank, yes?'

'Yes.'

'I'd rather you teach him a lesson much like you taught our host. I don't like the way he watches me; makes it harder for me to do my job.'

'Me either. I'll talk to Tripp to make sure he doesn't bother you.'

I nodded and got out first and dried off, looking myself over. My nipples were still incredibly sensitive and the towel was almost too rough for them. Clint had left a couple of marks on my hips from how firmly he'd grasped me, but they'd be gone by morning. 

I walked back to the bed and crawled back in, pulling up the covers and rolling on my side. I felt the bed dip as Clint got in and he moved over and put his arm around me, pulling me tight to his chest.

 

* * *

Steve's POV

Agent May and I circled the base, studying it for possible methods of entry. There were so many trees here that it wouldn't be hard to get close to the walls, some of the larger trees even had branches extending over the base, making me sure that they never left from the air even though the courtyards were large enough for a helicopter to land in. 

This base was only accessible by a rough dirt road that wound through the forest. If it weren't for the databases they kept here, it would be of no strategic value to us to take it. There were very few exterior cameras and we evaded them easily before heading back to camp.

"How good are your tree climbing abilities, May?" I asked as we walked.

May looked a little closer before answering. "I'd need a boost to get into some of them, but I'm pretty good," she replied. "There's no way they'd hold your weight, though, Captain. You're what, 220?"

"Easily, and I'm well aware of that, May," I said with a grin. "I can jump that north wall, but that doesn't give me enough time to let the gas off without affecting myself. It won't knock me out, but it doesn't feel very good."

"Sarah would be upset if she heard you did something so reckless," May pointed out, raising an eyebrow at me. "I can't say I didn't warn you."

I sighed heavily. "Don't remind me - I haven't forgotten the last time she chewed me out."

"She had a good reason to - parachutes aren't optional unless you have your own wings."

"Yeah, yeah. Does everyone know about that?"

"Probably."

"Anyways, I only have one other man that would be light enough to send up on the other side, and his target is the ventilation shaft over there."

"I see. What do you have in mind?"

"The two of you go in through the trees, gas the courtyard and open the gate. If you walk along the roof there, you should be able to go in from the window on the top floor. Incapacitate the lookout stationed there and we might even be able to take it without a shot."

"Bold, risky, I like it," May said, smiling slightly. "I have my icers with; they put a man down for at least an hour, gives them one hell of a headache, too. I know you're pretty attached to your shield, but you should give the icer a try sometimes." 

"I'll certainly consider it. One of Fitzsimmons new toys? Sarah told me about them."

"Of course. They have something else for you to look at if you're ever with us on the bus."

"They aren't going to start testing me, are they?"

"No, Sarah had a talk with them; they get a little excited at times."

"You don't say?" I gave her a look and she shrugged. Sarah's friends were an interesting group, to say the least. I never knew what to expect next. "And May - don't knock any of my guys out this time. I only brought who I needed."

"If they're half as trained as you led me to believe, it shouldn't be a problem."

I shook my head at the feisty agent and went to round up my men to set our plan in motion. The last time I'd worked with May, one of the Strike guys had made an unfortunate remark that May had quite rightly taken exception to. She'd laid him out cold in seconds, reinforcing her almost legendary reputation as someone you don't mess with. I shook Jake awake, disarming him when he woke with his gun in his hand.

"Shh. Sorry Jake, but you have to get up now," I said, handing him back his gun now that he was more awake. "But we need to do some planning and then get this done. Agent May came in to give us some new intel."

He rubbed his hand over his face tiredly. "Be right there, Cap. I'll wake the others."

I nodded and moved over to the other side of camp, rousing men quietly and giving directions. I signaled for the sentries to come in and headed back to May. She was right where I'd left her, tapping at the tablet to bring up building plans. I waited for everyone to come in closer before giving them their instructions. We broke camp and started making preparations.

The plan went off without a hitch. I tossed May up high enough so she could reach the branches of the tree we'd chosen for her and ran around to wait for her signal. A couple minutes later, the gates were open and we rushed inside. Jack blew the main door and we tossed in a couple gas cylinders, giving them enough time to take effect. 

I was the only one without a mask on, having given mine to May. The gas didn't really affect me, but too much would give me one hell of a headache - and it smelled funny. We only had to fire one shot total, and that was when May had to take out the lookout with her icer. 

We got to work, rounding up the passed out soldiers, disarming them and locking them in the holding cells we found. There weren't very many soldiers here, only about a dozen in all. There were a lot of noncombatants that we found slumped over computers, though. We rounded them up as well, putting them in another cell. I worked my way up to May, finding her working at the computer in the lookout.

"Did you have any problems, May?"

"Not with him, no. I'm setting up a window for Skye so she can access their computers. Would you call her and get her on a secure line for me? This system's acting strangely."

"On it." I pulled out my phone and started the encrypted call to a line on the bus. Skye answered right away.

"Skye, it's Captain Rogers." I pulled the phone away from my ear as she squealed. "Skye, please calm down. I'm here with May and she wants to talk to you." I put the phone on speaker and held it so May could talk into it.

"Skye, what have I told you about fangirling?" May chided her. 

"Sorry Steve," Skye said contritely. 

"I'm almost done with your window," May said then. "Can you get through from your side?"

"Not yet. I can tell you've bypassed their security encryption; has it been giving you error messages yet?"

"Yes, and I've ignored them all. How do I tie in the uplink so it doesn't trigger the failsafe?"

"Give me one minute here and I'll redirect the data stream so it loops back through." I could hear her typing rapidly over the phone. "I'm in. Tell me what the set up looks like physically from where you're sitting."

"The monitor is tied into a security console," May said. "I've got a lot of switches and gauges. Do I need to flip anything?"

"Yes. There should be a toggle switch labeled 'wireless feed' or something similar. Switch that one off."

"Camera feed?" I said.

"Yup. Is there only one or is there a row of them?"

"I've got four in a row. All the same position right now."

"Switch them all off," Skye ordered. I flipped the switches.

"Done," May said.

"Great - now erase the last hour's footage and they'll never know you were there," she said cheerily.

"Copy that. Are you getting what you need, Skye?" I asked.

"Yeah," Skye said and I could hear her typing rapidly. "Oh shit – you guys need to see this!"

"Put it on the monitor for us if you can," I said. 

"I can. Fitz, go get the rest of the team. Tell them it's urgent." I shared a look with May as we watched the computer monitor in front of us. A new box popped up that showed the plans for another Hydra base a couple of hours from here.

"May, are you seeing what I'm seeing?" I asked in horror as I saw pictures of weapons popping up on screen along with blueprints for other weapons. They were all based off the Tessaract technology I thought I had destroyed in '45.

"Yeah," she breathed. "Steve. I really don't like the looks of this."

"Skye, forward this to Director Fury ASAP," I ordered. "We're on our way out of here now."

"Will do. May, we'll be at the rendezvous in a half hour," Skye said.

"Tell them to expect company," May said, meeting my eyes. "I'm bringing Captain Rogers and his squad, too - if that's all right with you, Captain."

I nodded. It would be best to let them drop us at the next target since they were already so close.

"Sweet!" Skye cheered. 

"We're going to need to be ready to move as soon as we get our orders," I said as the line went dead and I put my phone away, looking at May.

"My thoughts exactly. I'm not going to let them bastards slink off to their lair again."

"I still need to call in the cleanup squad and we should head down to the courtyard. You'll need your mask, though. It's still pretty strong in some places."

She put on the bulky mask, gesturing for me to lead. We moved through the base, doing a final check and sending everyone to the courtyard. My men had done a good job and I didn't find anything to be concerned about.

"Listen up!" I said loudly, waiting briefly for their undivided attention. "We're going to be hitching a ride with Agent May for right now. New intel suggests Hydra's on the move and since we're already close to the location, our team will be taking on this new mission. Follow whatever orders Agent May gives you, copy that?"

"Copy, Captain," they chorused, looking over to May intently - a hint of hero worship in their gaze. 

She rolled her eyes at me but led the way into the woods to her rendezvous point. We made it there in good time; it wasn't long before May pressed a button on a remote and a Quinjet uncloaked. I opened the ramp and we all loaded up, May heading for the cockpit.

"You know how to fly one of these things yet, Rogers?"

"For the most part," I said. "I haven't done it on my own yet."

"Take the co-pilot chair, and I'll watch you after we get in the air," she said, flipping the switches to initiate vertical takeoff. "Who's been teaching you?"

"Romanoff and Barton. They usually let me try to fly when we're on our way back and not in a hurry."

"With or without smartass comments?"

"It's Romanoff and Barton," I said, thinking that was explanation enough. "I think their pictures are in the dictionary under the definition of smartass."

May smiled and lifted off skillfully. I flipped the switches to rotate the wings after we had cleared the trees and we headed for the bus. I wasn't sure why they called it a bus when it was obviously an airplane, but that's what they referred to it as.


	29. Curtain Call

Brazil  
Sarah's POV

 

I woke up early and reached for my phone to see what time it was: 6am. Clint's arm was still wrapped around me and I mentally ran through what we did last night. I understood that it had to sound believable but was still amazed at how little actually happened.

At least I would still be able to face him today without flushing every time he looked at me. I eased out from under Clint's arm and went to go to the bathroom. When I came back to the bed, Clint was wide awake and texting someone. I climbed back into the bed and put my head on his shoulder to see what he was typing.

Ryan had been on guard last night and had just switched off with Ward. When I'd been wandering with Nadia, I'd noticed the patrols were roughly 10 minutes apart. There had been a lot of interest in our wing during the time after supper until midnight with patrols constantly in the hallway during our performances. Clint handed me the phone and turned so he could see me. I opened an app I'd built and captured a video loop of us snuggling, taking over the camera after a ten second delay. I sat up and looked over at him, signing quickly.

_Bugs are still active but I have the video feeds on a short loop._

**_Are you ok?_ **

_I'm ok. Did they buy it?_

**_Ryan said it sounded legit to him. If I didn't know better, I'd have bought your act. How did you know I would like that?_ **

_Nat. She sent me a detailed file on what you liked and how to please you._

Clint's eyes widened and I grinned unrepentantly. It was his turn to feel uncomfortable now. He hadn't known the extent of Natasha's planning, then. ** _I can't believe she did that._** I quirked a brow and he shook his head. **_Never mind, yes, I can. She bought and packed everything for this mission for both of us, after all._**

_Yup._

**_I think our host was suspicious about Nat until we made up that part about her being mad at me for taking on a second woman._ **

_You paid my family well for me a couple months ago, btw. Nadia was probing me as much as I was probing her._

**_I hope you're worth it then_**. He grinned at me as I lightly slapped him in the shoulder and laughed.

_So what should I expect today?_

**_More drinking and card playing. Release the loop_ ** **_before they get suspicious._ **

_10 seconds._

I laid back down in my previous position, setting the phone on the nightstand.

He pushed my hair out of my face and kissed my forehead. "Go back to sleep, 'Ria. I'm not ready to get up yet."

"Okay." I turned so my back was to him and closed my eyes as he put his arm around me.

* *    

I woke to a gentle shaking of my shoulder. "Time to get up, sleepyhead."

I opened my eyes to see Bobbi standing over me. I was alone in bed; Clint had gotten up at some point and then I heard the shower. "What time is it?"

"9. If you hurry up and get ready, we'll go down to breakfast together. I don't know about you, but I'm starving!"

I sat up in bed and stretched before climbing out. "Why don't you pick an outfit for me while I shower?"

Bobbi ran her eyes over me and grinned. I realized I was still naked, never having put anything back on after we'd showered last night.

"Sure. I love playing in other people's closets. Did you have fun last night?"

"Of course." I waggled my eyebrows at her and giggled, a slight flush warming my cheeks. "Sounded like you did too." We'd heard them through the walls.

"Hunter is great in bed," Bobbi said with a smirk. "He knows what I like."

I heard a wolf whistle from the open adjoining door and could see a half-naked Hunter from where I was standing. I flipped him off and walked into the bathroom. "Piss off, Hunter. Barbie, go deal with your man before Ronin beats him." I slammed the door and walked straight into Clint, rebounding off his chest. He caught me before I could slip on the wet floor. "Ow!" I rubbed my nose. My eyes stung and I took a deep breath.

"Are you okay, 'Ria?" He rubbed his hands up and down my arms.

"Fine. Nothing like greeting your man's business partners naked to start your day off on the wrong side of the bed."

His light blue eyes looked at me in concern. "Do you want me to kill him for you?"

"No, just punch him a couple times or something. I know reliable partners are hard to find these days."

He laughed and kissed me before he let me get in the shower, keeping up the act. I heard him talking to Bobbi as I turned the water on. She was waiting for me when I got back into the bedroom.

"Sorry about that. I thought I shut it when I came in earlier," she said as she studied me with a contrite smile.

"Thanks. Wasn't expecting to see him right then. What did Ronin do?"

"Punched him." She shrugged, unconcerned. "He deserved it. Get dressed and I'll help you with your hair."

"Sure. So have you met this Cesar or Sahib-son before?" I found some underwear and looked to see what kind of top she had picked so I could choose a bra. It was a halter top, so I found my convertible bra and rearranged the straps.

"You don't need to wear that, Maria. It has a built in bra."

I tossed the convertible one back in the drawer and put the top on. I held my hair out of the way while Bobbi tied the top for me.

"Cesar, yes. He is a very interesting man. He and Hunter have done a lot of lucrative deals before. Sahib's son, I haven't met; at least, I don't think I have. So what was up with Khan last night? He couldn't keep his eyes off you."

"I don't care for his staring. Did I have something in my teeth or does he just lack manners?"

"I think you should tell Tripp about him. As Ronin's head of security, he needs to know if there is a possible threat to you." She met my eyes in the mirror with a smirk. "If Khan wants a woman that badly he should have brought his own with him." We walked back into the bathroom and I rubbed a defining crème into my hair before sitting on the stool at the vanity.

"You don't think he would try anything while we are here, do you?" I looked up at Bobbi and she shrugged.

"Try, yes; succeed, no. Ronin will make him back off before then, but with these kinds of men, you never know. They're used to getting what they want when they want it. They don't understand the word 'no'; they think it doesn't apply to them."

She picked up the blow dryer and tugged lightly on my curls to relax them a little bit so they would fall in softer waves than my usual tight curls. I applied my makeup while she did that and I was ready to go in a couple minutes. Tripp met us at the door.

"The others are already at breakfast, ladies. Ryan was overnight last night, so he will join us later. Master Ronin has given orders that Khan is not to be allowed near either of you without himself or Mr Hunter present."

I breathed out a loud sigh of relief before smiling at the older man. "Thank you, Tripp. We're ready to go to breakfast now."

He nodded slightly. "Would you like me to lead or follow?"

"Lead. I'm sure we could find it ourselves, but I'd hate to take a wrong turn and end up in the kitchens or something." I smiled like Chloe would when she got someone to do what she wanted.

"Follow me, ladies. I do know the way, and it doesn't involve going through the kitchens." We laughed as we fell into step behind him.

After breakfast we were left to our own devices until around 11. I used that time to secure our room and hack my way into their security feed. I'd been right earlier and there were still a couple bugs in each room. Good thing we gave them a loud show last night.

I set up a faster access point for myself and saved looped footage of the empty rooms for later in case we needed it. It took a little more time to hack into their satlink and hide a Shield line into the background that my friend Skye would be able to access as long as I kept the window open. When I'd done all that I could for now, I sent her and Nat a text and went to find Bobbi. I showed her what I sent them and she nodded.

"I'm going to go find Nadia." I told Bobbi. "Do you want to come with?"

"Sure. She might be up by now."

"What time are we supposed to join Hunter and Ronin?"

"We don't need to meet up with them until after lunch. Vidente was giving them a tour of his facility and was showing them where the pilot will land."

"Oh. I'm glad we didn't need to go with today; I saw that Khan was going as well."

"If he doesn't quit watching you soon I'll put a knife in his ribs myself," she said with a sweet smile. I blinked at her in surprise.

"He hasn't done anything to warrant Ronin intervening yet, just staring. He creeps me out." I typed on my phone briefly: _Running facial recog on him but no hits._  I handed it to Bobbi, who looked at it and nodded as we headed to the door.

We took Ward with us today as we went to Nadia's rooms. Tripp and Ryan were with Clint and Hunter on the tour. I led the way, arm linked with Bobbi's and chattering with her like we were best friends. I asked the guard at her door if she was there and he nodded.

I impatiently gestured for him to move aside and he did after a slight hesitation. I knocked as I opened it and called out, "Nadia? Are you up yet? It's almost time for lunch."

We walked in and Bobbi shut the door behind us in the guards face. We quickly looked around, trying to find her. She wasn't in bed or any of the adjoining rooms. Finally, we went over to the last closed door, which I figured was probably the bathroom. I didn't hear the shower, so I knocked before opening the door.

"Nadia? Are you in there?"

She was laying on the bathroom floor with a washcloth over her eyes. I knelt by her side and felt for respiration and a pulse. She was breathing and her pulse was steady, a little slow, but otherwise fine. I picked up the washcloth and felt her forehead and cheeks. They were a little clammy, but not too bad. I shook her arm gently.

"Nadia. Wake up."

"Do you think she fainted?" Bobbi asked as she knelt on Nadia's other side and shoved some towels under her legs, raising them. "It doesn't look like she fell."

"I don't know. I'm going to tell her guard to bring her doctor. I'm sure they have one here."

"I'll stay with her and see if she'll come around."

I took her cold hand in mine and chafed it for a bit before doing the same for the other hand. I could hear Bobbi insisting that they fetch Nadia a doctor. It sounded like someone made a phone call. A couple minutes later I heard Bobbi bringing in the doctor and I shifted so he could come in.

"I found her on the floor a little bit ago and she wouldn't wake up. She had a washcloth on her eyes and we raised her legs thinking that would help."

The doctor nodded to acknowledge me and pulled out his stethoscope and listened to her heart and lungs. He checked her pulse and opened her eyes to shine a light in them. He dug in his bag and found an ammonia packet and opened it, holding it under her nose. The bitter smell filled the air and a couple moments later, she coughed and rolled on her side, moaning. Her eyes fluttered open and the doctor sat back on his heels, observing.

"Miss Nadia, can you hear me?"

"Doctor Varga, what are you doing here?" she asked weakly.

"Your friends found you laying on the floor. Can you tell me why?"

"My friends?"

"It's Maria and Barbie," I said. "We came to visit while the men were out. What happened, Nadia?"

"I felt like I was going to throw up, so I came in here to lay down until I felt better. It usually doesn't take very long for the feeling to go away."

The doctor perked up. "Do you often feel nauseous, Miss Nadia?"

"No, just in the past week I have felt queasy in the morning for a little bit. Otherwise, not unless I had too much to drink the night before."

My mind made the same jump that the doctor's did. It was a reasonable assumption based on her age and relationship with Vidente.

"Have you noticed any other changes recently? Do strong smells make you nauseous?"

"Vidente's cigar smoke makes me want to puke. I've been really tired lately and I have to go to the bathroom a lot."

"Well, Miss Nadia, without a test I can't say for sure, but it is possible you could be pregnant."

It was a good thing she was on the floor already because Nadia's eyes rolled back and she fainted again. I chafed her hand and the doctor got out another ammonia packet.

"Do you have a pregnancy test she can take, Dr Varga?"

"I do in my office. I can go get it and bring it back if you would like to bring her around. She just had a bit of a shock this time."

"Of course. We will be here."

Dr Varga got up and left, leaving his bag there.

Bobbi poked her head in the door, a concerned look on her face. "She okay?"

"Yeah. Just got some surprising news." I opened the packet and held it under her nose, wrinkling my own at the pungent smell.

"I figured that was the case. Most people don't take that news very well if they aren't trying to get pregnant."

"I believe it."

Nadia coughed and her eyes flickered open. I moved the packet away and leaned over so she could see me.

"How do you feel, Nadia?"

"I don't know. Did he really say what I thought he said?"

"Yes. He went to go get a pregnancy test for you to take. Do you want to sit up or have a drink of water?"

"Water. My tongue is fuzzy."

I looked up at Bobbi, who walked out of the room again. I helped pull Nadia upright slowly as I heard Bobbi open a fridge in the other room. She came back with a water bottle and handed it to Nadia. "Here Nadia. I'm glad you're feeling better."

Nadia opened the water and took a cautious sip. By the time the doctor returned, she had drank about half of it.

"Here you go, Miss Nadia. If you will do this test and call me with the results, I will make sure my wife is available to be present so that we may have a more private discussion later."

"Thank you, Dr Varga. I will call you in the next couple days after everyone has left again."

He nodded and picked up his bag and stethoscope, nodding to Bobbi and I before leaving. I reached down to her and pulled her to her feet, steadying her when she wobbled.

"Do you want to take that now or later? Barbie and I can leave if you'd like to be alone."

"Please stay. I would like to do it now. I feel I need to know sooner rather than later. Will you read me the instructions?"

"Yes. They are in English, so I will go slow. Tell me if you don't understand what I'm reading to you." I read her the instructions and opened the box to give her the plastic wrapped little pink stick. She took it with shaking fingers. "It'll be fine, Nadia. We'll wait out here for you."

She flashed us a wan smile as we turned and left the bathroom, closing the door behind us. I shared a look with Bobbi; she probably had at least ten years on me, and I was curious now.

Bobbi shook her head, "Nope. I take birth control. Hunter and I are not ready to be parents. Some days I'm convinced he's really my kid instead of my man." I giggled at thought that popped into my head.

"I just pictured Hunter in diapers. Big blue diapers."

She burst out laughing. "That's even better payback than Ronin punching him this morning."

"I know, right? I just wish I could have seen him do it. Nadia, are you okay in there?"

"Yes. Just finished." I heard the toilet flush and the sink running. Nadia came out a minute later, carrying the pink stick. I flipped the box back over and we looked at the pictures again.

"Plus is pregnant, one line is not."

"Someone look at it for me and tell me what it says. I can't look!"

We peered down at it to see a distinct red plus sign. "Congratulations, Nadia! You're pregnant!" I said and promptly caught her before she hit the floor. Bobbi and I picked her up and laid her on the bed before I went back into the bathroom to find the ammonia packet I had set on the floor earlier. I found it and held under her nose again. Nadia woke with a sneeze.

"That's three now. Ready to get up for the day?" I grinned and Bobbi laughed. She sat down on the other side of the bed.

"Nope. I'm going to lay down for a while and have them send me a tray," Nadia groaned and rubbed her face with her hands.

"Not today, you can't. We're expected at the table shortly; Hunter said someone else is supposed to be coming in this morning."

"Ughh. I forgot about that. Shah is coming today. Hopefully he brings Amina with this time. You will like her, Maria. Have you met them, Barbie?"

"I'm sure I will." I climbed up on the bed next to her and pulled her up so she was sitting.

Bobbi nodded. "I think so; they don't usually come this far west. Whatever it is we're bringing in must be worth it for them to be coming here."

Nadia nodded. "It must be. Usually we go meet them at Shah's compound in Iran."

"Will you tell Vidente now or wait until you are further along, Nadia?" I asked. "I'm guessing you're only a little over a month from what you told the doctor earlier."

"I'll wait until tonight. He'll find out from someone else otherwise. My guards will tell him that the doctor was here when they see him. They are very loyal to him." She wrapped her arms around her legs and rested her head on her knees.

"Do you feel up to getting in the shower?" I asked, seeing that she had some color again now.

"Yes, I feel much better now." She climbed off the bed and padded to the bathroom.

"Can I pick an outfit for you?" Bobbi asked.

"That would be nice. Something sexy like what you're wearing?" Nadia suggested.

"You got it."

*     *

Half an hour later, we were walking to the dining room, Ward following us as we walked arm in arm together chattering easily. We were all dressed to impress in outfits that highlighted our better features. My halter top was low cut and showed my toned midriff. My skater skirt barely covered my ass, showing off my long legs. Bobbi had found the sexiest underwear in my drawer for me to wear under it.

Bobbi's outfit was similar, a racerback bra-like top that came down to the end of her ribs and her skirt was just a little longer, almost fingertip length. Nadia was stunning in a sleeveless tight white polo shirt that tied under her breasts and a pleated skirt that was just as short as mine - reminding me of early Britney Spears music videos.

The men were just coming into the room as we arrived. We scattered, going over to our respective males. Clint gave me an appreciative look and ran his hand down the side of my face.

"You look stunning today, 'Ria. I'm proud that you're mine." He smiled, holding my eyes.

"You're always proud of me, Ronin." I grinned as I leaned up against him and stretched up for a kiss.

"True." He kissed me again. "Very true." He ran his hand down my back and stepped back to guide me to the table. Bobbi maneuvered Hunter over so he was seated on my other side and I noticed Khan's moue of disappointment that he wasn't able to get closer to me. He settled across the table from us as the servants brought in the first course. I looked over and saw that Vidente was talking quietly with Nadia, so I turned to Clint.

"How was the tour?"

"Quite interesting. I'm impressed with the size of this base. We should be able to land the package quite close by if the weather holds. There's a large tropical storm blowing in from the east; it's not supposed to hit near here, but it may delay our delivery for a day or two."

"Nadia said Shah is supposed to get here today."

"Excellent. He should beat the storm then. I haven't seen him in ages." The gleam in his eye was decidedly bloodthirsty and I quirked a brow at him. He shook his head and looked over at Khan, who had just asked Hunter a question.

We conversed amicably throughout the leisurely meal; the men bragging about their various good deals and trying to one-up each other. I had to remember to be 'helpless Maria' and hang on Clint's every word, saying the right things at the right times. Most of the stuff he was talking about was before my supposed time with him, so it wasn't hard to feign interest in his stories. He was a good storyteller, but then this was also the most I'd ever heard him talk about himself, to be honest.

I had the feeling that most of Hunter's stories were actually true, just repackaged for a non-Shield audience. Clint and Hunter had actually worked together enough that they could take turns telling parts of stories, which I hadn't known they could do. I was learning there was a lot more to Clint than I'd suspected, which confirmed that he, like Natasha, was a master assassin of a caliber I only hoped to reach eventually.

Vidente's stories told of his brutal rise to power in the area until he earned his moniker by being able to predict his enemies movements and counter-strike with minimal losses to his forces. If the stories were true, and I felt they were, he would bear watching. He was intelligent, ruthless, and commanded loyalty easily; a modern warlord – not someone to underestimate.

Khan's stories, on the other hand, painted him as more of a businessman who let his men do the fighting for him. He didn't wear any visible marks of his violent lifestyle in the way that Hunter, Clint and Vidente did. He was soft, reminding me of a politician or the son of a rich man, used to getting his way by either threatening or taking what he wanted.

Sometime during the meal an argument started over who was the better shot between Hunter and Clint, so afterwards, we all went down to a shooting range so they could settle it. Vidente had his men bring guns, ammo and ear protection. He and Khan were also joining in while us women watched.

Clint gave me a teasing look, knowing how badly I wanted in on the shooting. I felt a little better since Bobbi wasn't joining either, we shared a commiserating grin. We stood on either side of Nadia, who was apparently not very comfortable around firearms and was only out here because we were. She quivered, squeezing my arm tightly when the louder guns went off.

They each took three shots with the same gun at a target before the target was brought up for inspection after each round. I noticed that Clint was an excellent marksman, even while using a variety of guns instead of his bow; I also noticed he had subtly turned off the hearing aid in the ear closest to the gun. I personally believed that his profound hearing loss was part of the reason he preferred his bow to firearms.

At the end of the demonstration, Clint was pronounced the better shot, followed closely by Hunter and Vidente, Khan taking last by quite a bit. There was a huge difference between Khan's stance and handling of the guns versus the other men. He was clearly not used to handling more varieties than the one type his men preferred. I filed that tidbit away for later, wondering if Clint had noticed as well.

Khan was the first to turn to us after the demonstration, coming close enough to touch me. I was standing on the side closest to the men, taking off my ear protection and talking to Nadia. Bobbi's eyes flickered, warning me someone was behind me and as I turned, placing my back to Nadia, I saw one of Clint's swords was resting at Khan's throat, a thin red line welling over the edge of the blade. The other blade was resting on the wrist of the offending hand that was still outstretched to me.

Ward and Tripp had their guns drawn, both aimed at his heart. Hunter had the gun he'd used last for target shooting aimed at Khan as well. I gave my fellow agents full marks for their quickness so I didn't break character unintentionally. Nadia pulled me back away from Khan's hand and hid behind me. Vidente signaled his men to stand by but they hadn't moved as fast as the agents, not having been watching Khan closely.

"Apparently you must not have heard about me." Clint's voice was deep and powerful, drawing every eye to him. "This is your only warning, dog. What is mine will stay mine. Attempt to touch my Maria again and I will not hesitate to carve pieces from you, starting with the offending hand."

Khan had frozen the instant the metal had slit his skin. He met Clint's eyes, bewildered at the ferocity he saw there, slipping back into Arabic. "She is just a whore. Why do you value her so?"

"Maria is no whore," Clint replied in Arabic. Blood dripped from Khan's wrist and neck and the flow increased as more pressure was applied. "I was her first and I will be her last. She is mine and no other man is to lay a finger on her person. Ever." Anyone looking at him would not doubt that he could kill Khan without hesitation. Clint had a confidant, lethal feel to him, showing a depth that I was learning to appreciate.

"I will not provoke your ire again, Ronin," Khan vowed, eyes not leaving Clint's. "I thought the stories were just that – stories; I see now that they were all true."

Clint's response was spit in Khan's direction, slowly removing his blades from Khan's skin, shifting so the smaller man would have to pass him to leave the shooting range. Hunter lowered his gun first, having the least ideal shot at the man. If he were to miss or the bullet were to pass through, he stood a good chance of injuring myself or Nadia. Ward was the next to lower his gun, also not having an ideal shot. Clint nodded at Tripp, who was the last to lower his gun. Khan moved steadily past Clint, not rushing but also not at a casual pace, clearly deferring to Ronin.

Once Khan was past, Ward held out a handkerchief for Clint to clean his blades with. In seconds, Clint cleaned them and re-sheathed them before coming over to me. I stood frozen, eyes wide, trembling. He opened his arms to me and I hid my face in his chest as I pretended to be overwrought.

In reality, I was trembling with laughter at Khan's retreat with his tail between his legs and fighting to keep a smile from my face. He folded his arms around me and ran his hand gently over my hair. I took a couple deep breaths, breathing in the smell of sulfur, gunpowder, sweat, and that spicy male scent that was essentially Clint.

"Are you all right 'Ria? You know I would never allow harm to come to you."

"Y-yes. I don't like that man, Ronin."

"I know, sweetheart. He'll leave you alone or I'll kill him. Let's go back inside; it's time for siesta anyway." He scooped me up in his arms and I wrapped my arms around his neck, kissing him gently. He carried me back to our room and the others followed a little ways behind.

"You really don't have to carry me, Ronin," I murmured in his ear.

"You're like a feather, 'Ria. You need to eat more."

"Then my ass would get bigger."

"I like your ass just fine the way it is." He patted it firmly. "Even if it is hanging out of your skirt right now."

"Barbie picked it - blame her." I grinned at him, now used to the motion of being carried.

"I'll thank her later." He kissed me again. "I like it on you; it's sexy. You're so fucking sexy, Khan can't keep his eyes off you. I know I can't."

"You're pretty sexy yourself, tiger. I was pretty turned on by how intense you were earlier. I'm surprised you didn't just kill him. What did he think was going to happen? Was he just going to drag me back inside?"

"I don't know. I'm not sure if he respects me or if I should be watching my back while we're here."

"He doesn't strike me as the type to come at you directly on his own. Do I think he will put out a contract on you after he leaves here – yes; yes, I do. You'll have to ask Hunter what he thinks."

"I will," he said, a muscle in his jaw ticking. So what happened to Nadia earlier? Ward said you had the guard call the doctor to her rooms for her."

"She fainted a couple times. She's currently expecting."

"I see. Does Vidente know?"

"He will soon enough. She just found out this morning."

"Ahh," Clint said, quietly. "That makes sense. She seems to enjoy your company."

"Who doesn't? How do you think he'll take the news?"

"Like most men – as a shock. It'll take a while for it to sink in." He opened the door to our room and tossed me on the bed, laughing when I squeaked and bounced. I reached for my tablet and pulled up the weather forecast for our area. Clint went to the bathroom to go wash up. I handed him the tablet when he came back and he looked at the radar. It was looking like the storm would hit later today.

"When's Shah supposed to get here?" I asked. "This looks bad."

"If he's lucky, he'll land before the storm hits. We're a ways inland here but it might still get pretty ugly. Heavy rain will make the roads impassable for a couple days, even by Humvee. Our package won't be able to land here, then. They'll have to land at the airstrip we came in at, which is about 35 klicks west from here, maybe a little farther. We might be here for a little longer than we initially planned if that's the case."

He handed me back the tablet and took off his swords and boots. I set it on the nightstand and glanced at my phone to see if I had any new messages.

"You'd better let Natalia know that," I said with an arched brow. "I'm _not_ taking the blame for this one."

"Natalia knows we'll get home when we get home."

Clint sat down on the bed and I scooted over behind him. I pulled his sweat dampened shirt off and threw it on the floor with a plop. I put my arms around his neck and ran my hands over his chest. He flipped me over him with a neat little move I had to remember not to counter and I landed in his arms. He grinned when I nipped at his bicep and he flexed it to keep it away from my teeth. I shifted so I was sitting in his lap facing him. I put my arms around his neck and ran my fingers through his hair.

"Are we going straight home after this? I wouldn't mind an island detour on the way back. My tan could use a little work. See how pale I'm getting?" I ran my hands down the sides of my breasts, grasping my top to show more of my cleavage. His eyes followed my hands, making me smile.

"Hmm. I think I should inspect a little closer. I don't see any tan lines, 'Ria." He undid my top and pulled it off over my head, tossing it aside.

"I hope not. I tan nude so I don't have them." I shook my hair back behind me, reaching up to untangle it from my earrings and necklace as I gave him an innocent look.

"Then I agree - we should take the long way home." His hands skimmed down my back and over my legs. He found the zipper for my skirt and undid it and I stood up to kick it and my heels off. Clint made a strangled noise in his throat and I looked over at him, confused.

"Is that all you had on under that skirt?" he growled.

I gave him a puzzled look. "Of course. What else would I wear under a skirt? Was I not supposed to wear these? I think they're cute."

I spun in place so he could admire my underwear; they were black, strappy, lacy thongs that tied on one side. I stepped back over between his thighs and he ran his hands over my legs and ass before pulling me down into his lap again.

"Not quite the word I would have used." He captured my lips firmly, and I could feel his heart rate accelerate under my palms. He pulled me tight to him, crushing my breasts against his chest.

 


	30. Blast From the Past

Steve's POV

We climbed down the hatch from the Quinjet to Agent May's mobile command station, also known as 'the bus.' One of May's agents took my team to the living quarters so they could eat, get cleaned up and get some sleep until it was time to move out again. I followed May to the conference room where Skye was already waiting for us along with someone I'd never expected to see again.

"Agent Coulson? Is that really you?" I held out my hand to him, slightly surprised when he drew me into a hug. I clapped him firmly on the back. "How?"

"It's good to see you again, Captain Rogers." Phil Coulson said, finally drawing back from me. "Yes, it's really me. I'm afraid the answer to your question is classified, but I really did die for a short time on the helicarrier that day. They rushed me into surgery and somehow performed a miracle, but Director Fury wasn't sure they'd be able to save me. Long story short, I had surgery, spent some time in rehab and now I'm back in the field again."

"It's good to have you back," I said with a smile.

"It's good to be back. I take it that Agent Evans didn't inform you about my recovery?"

"No, she didn't say a word, but I've hardly seen her lately because we've been so busy. Who else knows, other than your team?"

"Agents Hill, Romanoff and Barton, possibly Stark, but we have something pressing to attend to at the moment, Captain."

"Of course, sir, my apologies."

"Have you met Skye?" Coulson asked me and I nodded.

"Hey Stevie, sorry I'm late," Skye said, rushing in with a couple computers in her arms. She set them down on the table and started opening the laptops.

"Thanks for your help earlier, Skye. Sarah's been teaching me, but I still don't know a lot about computers."

"Entirely understandably, Captain," a small young man said as he came in with some wires in his hands.

"You can't be expected to just catch up on 70 years worth of technological advances in three months, after all," a petite brunette finished for him, helping Skye and the other man set things up.

"Captain, these are the other members of my crew, Agents Leo Fitz and Jemma Simmons. They are our Sci-tech grads for research and development."

"Hello Captain Rogers, it's a pleasure to meet you," Fitz said, shaking my hand. "I'm engineering, she's biochem." I had no idea what that meant other than they did science stuff.

"We have something for you when you have time to stop in our lab," Simmons said, smiling at me.

I nodded and looked at Coulson and May, who only smiled. Images started popping up on the large screen on the wall and diagnostic holograms floated over a lighted table. I watched them with interest, my alarm growing with each image.

"Are these all fueled off of Tessaract technology?" I asked, sure that was what I was seeing.

"That's what we think," Simmons said, rotating an image on the screen.

"But Thor took the Tessaract with him when he took Loki back to Asgard," I said. "He needed it to get home since the Bifrost was destroyed. So what did they use to charge the fuel cells? Dr Selvig said the Tessaract was never out of his possession while he was building the wormhole device Loki used to bring the Chitauri through."

"Yes, that's why this is so baffling," Fitz said.

"Where did they find a power source that behaves so similarly to the Tessaract?" Simmons finished.

"There. What is that?" May asked pointing at another image. "A spear of some sorts?"

"Loki's scepter," Phil said, rubbing his hand over his heart, and I remembered he had been run through by that very weapon.

I ran my hand over my face, not knowing what to think. "How did they get a hold of that?" I asked, crossing my arms.

"It was never accounted for after the Battle of New York," May said, looking over at me. "After Agent Romanoff closed the portal, Shield has no record of its whereabouts."

"Until now. I wonder how Hydra got their hands on it?" Skye asked, tapping at the computer. "There's no record of purchase or acquisition of any kind."

"Captain, have you seen these devices before?" Fitz asked, beckoning me over to the holo-table. I liked these young agents, even if they did talk over my head at times and continually finish each others sentences.

"Not these exact ones, but very similar design. Johann Schmidt used sections like these in his weapons and bombs. If you got shot by one of these guns, you disapparated. Gone, poof." I pointed to a different gun. "These, though, these ones would blast through brick and concrete walls like they were made of cardboard. It didn't feel great when they hit my shield, either. It was like getting hit by a freight truck; I guess that's the best way to describe it."

"You're going to need backup, Captain." Skye said, enlarging a new image. "This is the base where they're storing these weapons." Another image popped up. "This is the transfer details for two days from now. Based off the coordinates, they're going to start distributing them to the other Hydra bases."

I looked at the documents for a minute, mentally reconciling what I knew with what I was seeing before turning to Coulson. "I'll need Natasha, Tony for sure, and Bruce, if he'll come."

"I have the green light for Stark and Romanoff, but Dr Banner is currently in Korea keeping an eye on things there."

"In addition to your men, Agent Romanoff is bringing the rest of the Strike teams that aren't needed for Barton and Evans mission." I nodded absently, studying the holographic plans and thinking through various strategies.

"Skye, do you have that computer program the Avengers use to previsualize missions?"

She looked at me blankly and I sighed. "I don't know what it's called, but Sarah uses it to show visuals for where we're going. It's animated and shows the route, goes through the building plans – I don't know how else to describe it."

She gave me a soft smile, shaking her head. "Did she create the program?"

I shrugged, not knowing the answer to that one."Possibly, probably, yes. She does things like that, make programs she thinks we'll use."

"We can try running them through the holo-table, Captain," Simmons said, looking at Fitz.

He nodded. "It doesn't do everything you described, but you can move through blueprints similarly on it, if that's what you need."

"That'll work. Thank you, Fitz, Simmons." I smiled at the young scientists. "Can you show me the basics of how to run this table?"

"We'll try, but it takes a bit to get the hang of it," Simmons said, smiling at Fitz. Their hands flitted over the table, putting away the designs they had open and pulling up the blueprints of the base from a file Skye must have sent to the table somehow.

"All right, Captain. We're ready for you. Umm, you're quite tall, I won't be able to do this from next to you or behind you." Simmons said, looking me over and worrying her bottom lip. "Can you stand behind me so I can direct your motions? Fitz, be ready in case this doesn't work."

I moved so the small woman was in front of me and stretched my arms out so she could move me how I was supposed to.

"The table is extremely sensitive to motions, Captain. A little goes a long way." Her small fingers curled over mine, moving them into position and we motioned to spin the holo so we were walking in the front gate. She moved my fingers again and with another slight motion, there was a blinking dot moving through the passages in the base. "Now if you do this, watch." She moved my hand apart and the drawing enlarged, showing details that were quite small earlier.

"And to put it back?" I asked, letting myself be her puppet.

"Do this. Oh, Fitz –"

"Got it Jemma. Slower this time, I think."

"You're right, that was quite fast. Let's try that again, Captain."

"It worked!" I said excitedly. "Can I move the layers apart?"

"Yes, a bit. Umm, stretch your fingers out flat and move them apart like mine. Yes, that's good. Curl them slightly – no, like this – and raise this arm up slowly while keeping the other one where you started out." We made the motion and the blueprints distorted radically. "No, let's try that again, it really shouldn't look quite like that. Thank you, Fitz."

The plans reverted back to how they looked before that last motion, much to my relief. We repeated our earlier motion, but slower and without the horizontal movement that had happened due to our height difference. We reversed that motion and put the plans back together.

"If I may, I'd like to try it myself, Agent Simmons."

She looked over at Fitz, who shrugged one shoulder and gave a slight nod. "All right, Captain. We'll be right here if you need help, okay?"

"Thank you." I took a step back, and to the side so I was standing next to her. I repeated the motions we'd used earlier and talked my way through the base, showing them my plan. Coulson and May offered suggestions while Skye found surveillance footage to help me with the planning. I hit minor snags a time or two, but Fitz and Simmons sorted me out easily.

Within an hour, we had the majority of the plan figured out, we were just waiting for the latest surveillance from the Shield satellites, which wouldn't pass over the base for another couple hours, according to Skye.

I turned to Fitz and held a hand out to him. "Thank you for all of your help, Agent Fitz."

"You picked that all up rather quickly, Captain. Usually it takes about a week for most people to learn how to use it."

"Ward still can't, Fitz. I don't even think he knows how to turn it on," Simmons said as she came over to stand next to Fitz. I held a hand out to her as well.

"Thank you as well, Agent Simmons. You're an excellent teacher."

"Have you used holos before, Captain?"

"It's similar to Tony's holo's in his lab. I've watched him and Sarah use them enough that I at least have a basic understanding of what I could and couldn't do with it."

"Ah, that explains it," Fitz said, making a face. "Of course Stark would have his own holos."

"You just needed to know the specific motions," Simmons finished.

"Yes. I've learned each system is slightly different in their commands." I looked over at Coulson and he gestured at Fitz and Simmons. "I have some down time now if you both would be willing to show me around your lab? Sarah said it's something else."

"Of course, follow us, Captain," Fitz said.

"Too bad she couldn't come with you today," Simmons said. "I understand she's on a different mission in South America right now."

"I believe so; I left before she did. I haven't been home for a couple days now. How'd you know about that?"

"Skye. She said she's waiting for an encrypted transmission from Sarah sometime today yet."

 

*   *    *

Sarah's POV

I shut off my alarm and turned to face Clint, who was somehow still sleeping. I kissed him, attempting to wake him up, only to find myself being pulled back on top of him, his arms firmly around me. I knew he wasn't fully awake yet - he was murmuring endearments in Russian.

I shook him gently. "Ronin, it's time to get up. I need to get dressed again."

He opened his eyes and it took them a bit to focus on me. "I slept so good, 'Ria. Did you sleep well?"

"Like a baby. Now let me up so I can get dressed."

"Nope. Gonna keep you barefoot and naked."

"I think the saying is really 'barefoot and pregnant' and I'm not going for that one right now."

"Why not? Sounds good to me. Takes a lot of practice to knock someone up."

I snorted. "You've got enough practice in already today. Now let me get dressed before you have to punch Hunter again."

I gave him a peck on the lips and swung off of him. My top was dirty from rubbing on Clint's shirt and arms earlier, so I dug through my closet until I found another one. I pulled it on and rummaged through my underwear drawer until I found a pair of boyshorts. I pulled them on and went to find my skirt only to notice Clint staring at me interestedly.

"What kind of underwear is that? I like them."

"They're called boyshorts. I like them under this kind of skirt a little better. My cheeks are covered now. The material of your cargo pants is a little rough on my skin otherwise." He sat up in bed, watching me get dressed. I grinned at him teasingly. "Besides, I'm pretty sure you like all of my panties – especially when I drop them."

I walked into the bathroom to fix my hair and makeup. I had a couple of nice marks on my neck and part of the mark on my breast was visible thanks to the plunging neckline of the halter top I had on. My hair would cover some of them, but if he did it to claim me in front of Khan, they would serve their purpose.

"Won't deny that one," Clint said from the bedroom.

"Who's denying what?" asked Barbie, knocking as she was coming in the adjoining door. "You guys ready to go yet?"

"I will be in a little bit," I heard Clint say. "Just have to finish getting dressed. Hunter ready?"

"Almost. I'll send him over in a minute. Nice hickey, Ronin."

"Like you can talk," he scoffed. "Get attacked by a vacuum cleaner again, Barbie?"

"Something like that."

I heard the door click shut and came back in the room to find Clint pulling on his pants. I tossed him a fresh t-shirt and he strapped his swords back on.

"What did you want, Ronin?" said Hunter as he walked into the room. I sat on the bed and pulled my heels back on before crossing my legs and leaning back to look up at the men.

"Have you seen the radar for tonight and tomorrow? We're set to get hit hard here."

"Yeah, I saw that. I called the pilot and talked to him when we got back to the room earlier. Nothing is coming in from the north until the storm passes. When it does, he said he could land at the same airstrip we landed at or at Bogota. Hopefully it moves on so that by tomorrow evening things can proceed as planned."

"We'll see, I guess. Ready to talk business?"

"Always. Nice outfit, Maria," Hunter said, running his eyes over me leisurely. " You okay now? Pretty sure Khan got the hint Ronin gave him earlier."

"If that was a hint, I'd hate to see an actual message," I said with a pretend shudder. 

I flicked my hair back behind my shoulder and stood up, walking over to Clint and putting my arm through his. Hunter's eyes touched on the visible marks on my neck and chest.

"I see you marked your territory as well," Hunter said with a smirk. "£10 says Khan doesn't look at her for the rest of the night."

"You're on. Let's go."

Clint and I walked out the door and Hunter and Barbie were close behind. Tripp tailed us and Ryan was back behind Hunter again. We went into the conference room they had played cards in yesterday and Vidente, Nadia and another couple were there.

The man, Shah, was a little taller than I was, but older, in his fifties maybe and heavier set than the other men. His black hair was tinged with gray at the temples and his goatee was more gray than black.

The woman, Amina, was a striking desert beauty from what I could see. I wasn't sure, but I thought she was a little older than Nadia and I but not as old as Bobbi, early 20's, perhaps. Her brown eyes were captivating, sparkling with a inner warmth. She wore a red long sleeved, high necked dress made of a light, flowing fabric that fell to the floor, leaving only her face and hands visible. Shah must come from somewhere in the Middle East that was fairly traditional in their regard to women's clothing.

Vidente introduced us to them but Clint and Shah knew each other already, and I gathered it wasn't in a friendly way. If I had to guess, they respected each others reputations, but Clint was clearly the dominant male. Hunter and Shah shook hands and I gathered that Shah was wary of him as well, but not to the extent he was of Clint. It made me wonder what exactly Ronin's reputation was built on. Barbie greeted Amina in the Brazilian way and I followed her lead.

Shah nodded to the women as we were introduced but made no attempt to greet us otherwise. His eyes were drawn to me even as I ignored him and made my attachment to Ronin obvious. I was baffled why all of the Middle Eastern men I had met since becoming an agent were so attracted to me.

I would say it was my perfume, but I wasn't wearing anything except my usual body spray, which was a common one - at least back in the States. Khan came in just then; he greeted Shah familiarly in Arabic and nodded greetings to the rest of us. His neck bore a thin red line, as did his wrist when his cuffs rode up. He apparently had only somewhat learned his lesson, because while he still watched me interact with Clint, he stayed well out of his reach.

Vidente gestured for us to take seats at the card table and we did, Clint pulling me onto his lap. Nadia served us drinks and then took her seat on Vidente's lap.

"Comrades, I regret to inform you that the tropical storm on the Atlantic has delayed the arrival of several of our friends. With your permission, Ronin, I will extend the deadline until Saturday. The other parties should be able to arrive by then."

"Certainly, Vidente. We won't be able to deliver until the storm has either dissipated or moved on, and I refuse to risk such valuable cargo by rushing unduly."

Vidente nodded to one of his guards and he stepped out of the room. "Thank you. It will be taken care of."

Clint inclined his head to him. "Thank you. You have been an excellent host for this meeting of minds."

He smiled easily and raised his glass in a toast. "To the start of such beautiful friendships. May they be every bit as profitable as they promise to be."

"Hear hear," said Hunter, raising his glass and the rest of us followed suit.

The talk among the men meandered through multiple subjects, passing the time and giving everyone time to absorb the new dynamics. It was interesting to watch them show their teeth and bare their claws verbally in a uniquely male display of dominance.

If I had to put them in power order, I would say that Clint was the alpha, with Hunter being a close second. Vidente held himself enough apart from the demonstrations that I would almost label him an interested neutral party. From his interaction with Shah, I gathered that Shah outranked both him and Khan.

Two other men joined us in the conference room a short while later. The first one was Cesar, whom I'd heard of earlier. Brazil was his territory and Vidente clearly served him in some capacity. Cesar was a tall, dark haired man with flashing brown eyes. He was handsome, in his late 30's, and carried himself with a confident air. He bore faint marks of past violence on his skin, his gait flowing like that of my capoeira teachers.

The men rose as he approached the table, and it was obvious that he knew most of the men already as he exchanged familiar greetings with them and Hunter. With Ronin, though, he was slightly cautious in his approach, which I found interesting. Clint's muscles tensed slightly under my hands, but he greeted him amiably. Cesar looked over me appreciatively, but only nodded at me, wisely making no move towards my person.

The men had all just settled in for a card game when the second man arrived, drawing a fair amount of interest. Since the news of Sahib's detainment, I had wondered who his representative would be and if he could command the same respect that Sahib would have. The sight of another dark haired Middle Easterner at the door halted the conversations and the men rose to their feet.

I admired the unconcerned way this man walked into the room. He was a young man, by far the youngest of the company present - maybe early twenties. He was lean and well built, taller than all of the other men by a bit, putting him at about 6' 3. He had on casual fighting clothes similar to what Hunter and Ronin wore and carried himself like a man confident in his abilities. Vidente greeted him first, introducing the man in English as Talib, firstborn son of Sahib.

The man smiled widely and laughed. "You may call _me_ Sahib, Vidente. My father no longer has a place in this game and I claim his title as my birthright."

Sahib turned to greet the other Middle Easterners in Arabic and swiftly explained that his father was in captivity in Rio and not likely to return to his position. He'd been traveling separately and had changed his plans to make this meeting. While they stated their surprise at his announcement, they greeted him deferentially; either the title Sahib must be higher up than Khan's or Shah's - or he'd built up a formidable reputation already. I believed it to be the latter.

"I apologize for my sire's actions, Cesar," Sahib said. "He was always determined to acquire that which he desired, whether he had rights to it or not." Sahib extended a hand to the older man, waiting for Cesar to take it. After a moment, he did, with a small smile.

"This is true, Talib-Sahib. While there has been bad blood between your father and I for years, I am not aware of any reason I cannot work with you. I have followed your meteoric rise with interest for some time now."

Sahib bowed slightly in acknowledgement of the compliment. "I look forward to working with you as well, Cesar."

I looked up at Clint, studying his and Hunter's reactions. They waited for Sahib to approach them and Hunter greeted the younger man as a comrade, albeit an inferior one. Sahib smiled genially at Barbie, only glancing at her. He approached Clint last, since he was the farthest from the door. Clint gave off a feeling of restrained violence and Sahib's easy smile faltered momentarily. He extended his hand to Clint, who waited for a long moment before taking it firmly in his. Sahib pulled back his hand first, bowing slightly.

"It has been a long time since I last laid eyes on you, Ronin. My father always spoke highly of you."

"Your father and I have indeed dealt much together," replied Clint in Arabic, "but it has been some time. I don't remember ever meeting you then, though." Clint crossed his arms as he verbally challenged the newcomer. Sahib smiled, nodding.

"I was in training at one of his camps the last time you were in Iran to meet with him. As you said, it has been a couple years since your last face to face meeting. I was there during your earlier meetings, serving you when I was a youth, therefore easily overlooked by one of your status."

Clint nodded his head, allowing the younger man to attempt to ingratiate himself with him. "True. You would have been very young then - just a boy. You look more like your mother's people, though. She was always your sire's favorite wife."

Sahib smiled widely with pleasure. "You are correct, Ronin. My temperament comes from them as well."

Clint laughed and I felt the rest of the company relax. He put his arm around me, drawing me close to him and shifting back to English. "This is my Maria, Sahib. Did you not bring a woman of your own with you?"

He nodded to me, eyes sweeping me approvingly, taking in the marks Clint had left on me. "I did. My wife, Malika, suffers from jet lag so she is resting for now, but will join us for dinner."

"I look forward to meeting her, Sahib." I said, smiling up at him as I leaned into Clint. "Do you play cards? The game was just getting started."

"I always enjoy a good game," he said, eyes sweeping the table. He and Clint shared a look before the men resettled around the table, Bobbi sitting on Hunter's lap to make room for the new arrival.

The play continued until it got close to dinner time; Vidente dismissed us to dress for the meal, giving us time to go to our rooms and change before meeting in the dining room. I wasn't crazy about having to spend two more days here before we could begin the round-up, but we needed to get as many Ten Rings affiliates here as we could before taking the base, and we needed to do it without blowing Clint, Bobbi, and Hunter's covers. It had taken years for them to build up the layers to that kind of cover, so it would be worthwhile to preserve them for future use.

 

*         *          *

Steve's POV  
"So what exactly does this do?" I looked over the handgun they handed me. It felt similar to my M&P 9mm that was issued to me after I came back to active duty with Shield, but still different.

"Well, we've noticed that you don't carry a firearm, Captain and at times it would beneficial for you to have one," Fitz said. "This is non-lethal, so we thought it would appeal to you."

I nodded. That was pretty observant of them to notice that I didn't kill unless I had to; we weren't fighting a legitimate war right now that would call for it.

"It only incapacitates your target for about an hour, give or take depending on their weight," Simmons continued. "It releases a minute amount of dendrotoxin into the bloodstream on impact."

I was impressed. "Is this going to be standard issue?"

"Not yet, but hopefully," Simmons said with a big smile.

"We're still technically in the testing phase," Fitz finished.

"What will happen if I get hit by one of the rounds?"

"You and Agent Romanoff, probably nothing. Sarah said she felt tired for a couple minutes, but it didn't drop her."

"Somehow, I'm not surprised that she tested it." I said, sighing. "Did she shoot herself?"

"No, we hit some turbulence and I dropped the icer, firing a round. It accidentally hit her." Skye said, walking into the lab.

I sighed, knowing the young woman was lying through her teeth. "I'll tell her you covered for her, Skye, but I know Sarah well enough to know what really happened."

"Damn, you're good, Steve!" Skye said with a grin. "How'd you know I was lying?"

I gave her an amused look. "You've known Sarah for how long?"

"Two years, give or take. I knew her as a hacker before I joined Shield. We didn't meet face to face until last month."

"Ahh, that explains a few things. Have you ever been around her when she's inventing something? She's always the first person to test her ideas."

"Somehow that doesn't surprise me," Skye replied, her eyes flicking to the young scientists. "If you're done with the science twins, Coulson sent me to come get you, Steve."

"Yes, I think we're done with the Captain." Fitz said, clearly ready to get back to his work.

"If you decide you like the icer, we can send more rounds over to the Triskelion the next time we land," Simmons finished with a smile.

"Thanks, guys. I'll try it out and let you know, all right?"

They nodded as Skye grabbed my arm and pulled me out of the lab. I smiled to myself as I let her lead me. "Are they always like that, finishing each others sentences?"

"Yup. I think they share a brain and I totally ship it."

"What? Ship?"

"Never mind, I'll tell you later. Is your guy Jake single?"

"Not at the moment, but give it a couple weeks. He's gone a lot and civilian women don't seem to like that in a relationship."

"I'll keep that in mind. He's cute. Not that you aren't totally hot, Steve, but you're taken."

"Umm, thanks?" I said as she showed me into Coulson's office. "What have you got for me, sir?" I asked Coulson as I sat down in the chair across from his desk.

"I have a couple secure transmissions for you that Agent Romanoff forwarded on to me when I told her you were currently our guest. She seemed quite amused about how you were taught to run the holo-table." He handed me a thumb drive and I put it in my pocket for later.

"I'm sure she was. How did she find out about that?"

"Skye sent her a short video clip. They've become good friends once Natasha got done threatening her."

"Because she was new or because she thought Skye was a threat to you?" I asked, knowing how Natasha felt about Coulson.

"Both. Anyways, Skye didn't back down from her and sassed her right back, which amused Natasha, so long story short, they're friends." He shrugged and I nodded; it sounded like something Natasha would do.

"Should I be worried that she sent it to Sarah, too?"

"I don't think you have anything to be concerned about with Agent Evans. I still can't run that damn table to save my life. I'm not even allowed to touch it, so it's a minor miracle that you even got to do that."

"Some of the motions were quite particular. You saw what happened when I wasn't quite right with them; things jumped all over the place. So when did you meet Sarah?"

"Not long after I returned to duty. Directors Gregg and Fury sent her to meet me and my team to help us out on a mission.  She's a remarkable young Agent and her physical likeness to Peggy Carter is phenomenal."

"You knew Peggy," I stated and he nodded.

"Quite well; she only officially retired around 5 years ago. Have you been to see her?"

"Yes. They say she has Alzheimer's. On her good days, we have great, normal conversations. On her bad days, it's like she's seeing me for the first time since 1945." My chest ached just thinking about it. It was good to have Peggy back, but she wasn't the Peggy I'd known before the incident.

"I'm sorry to hear that, Captain. She never gave up hope that your body would be found eventually; she never would have believed that you could be reanimated, though."

"I wouldn't have believed it myself. They say that because of the serum, the extreme cold put me in a state of suspended animation."

"A regular human wouldn't have survived that. How are you doing, being in this time?"

"I still miss Bucky, but I've been a lot better now since meeting Sarah. She's been helping me get caught up with everything I missed. She's the best thing that's ever happened to me, Phil, and I don't know what I'd do without her."

"I hope you never have to find out, Steve."

"Are you still with your cellist?" I asked suddenly, a snippet of conversation coming back to me.

"No, she doesn't know I'm still alive. She's moved on, grieved; it wouldn't be fair to her to just show up and say 'so I'm not really dead, do you want to go to dinner?'"

"I suppose not; it was quite the shock. So is it a secret that you're alive?"

"Level 7 clearance, for now. I'm on a molehunt – someone's selling Shield intel to Hydra, and it's already cost us several good agents."

"Anything I can help you with?"

"No, unfortunately not. You might as well take advantage of your downtime, Steve. It'll be at least two hours yet before the satellites make their pass. There's a computer in the lounge so you can see your messages, if you'd like."

"Thanks again. It's been a pleasure working with your team today. I'll let my men know the plan as well." I got up out of the chair and started walking towards the door before a thought struck me. "Did you still want me to sign those trading cards, Phil?"

The older man looked at me with surprise, but then smiled, taking a deck of cards out of his desk drawer and handing them to me. "I'd love it if you would, Steve. Fury replaced the ones he ruined that day, so it's a complete set."

"I forgot they made those things until you mentioned it," I said, studying the paperboard cards. "I think they used to come with gum."

Phil nodded and smiled. "It was horrible gum, really. Crumbly, tasteless, hardened to cement after you chewed it."

"May I borrow a pen?"

Phil rummaged through his desk until he found a suitable one. "Here, Steve. This one shouldn't smear."

"Thanks. I'll get these back to you in a little while." I let myself out and headed to the lounge area. Some of the guys were sitting around and playing cards at the table, so I sat down in the booth, setting the trading cards on the table.

"What are you playing, Captain?" Jake asked, looking over at me. "Solitaire?"

"Not playing anything, Jake. Making good on a long overdue promise."

I uncapped the fine-point sharpie and started signing the cards individually, flipping each one over to see what they said on the back. I'd never bothered to look at them before; it wasn't something I saw during the war once I was overseas. The little patriotic messages on each one amused me; I'd never truly known the extent that I had driven the war effort with my propaganda films and photos, but here it was, all laid out for me. As I worked, I became aware of the men looking over my shoulder, reading the cards with me and laughing about them.

"Are these for real, Captain?" Jake finally asked as I snorted, reading a particularly patriotic one.

"Sure are. They made these back during the war. Used to come with gum, like baseball cards. There was even a comic book loosely based off of some of the things the Commandos and I did."

"Most of the time, I think you're just a regular guy my age with some awesome abilities, and then something drives it home that you really are like 90 years old or something like that."

"Some days I feel every 94 of those years." I said, moving on to the next card, not looking up at him; I didn't want to see pity in his eyes.

"What was it like, Captain?" Mike asked. "Waking up in this year and realizing everything was different?"

I set down the pen and looked up at them, realizing that these weren't idle questions. These men had seen me do things no other human could and still willingly followed me on each mission. "It was terrifying. One moment I was closing my eyes, believing that I was dying in that bomb filled plane I crashed into the Arctic, the next, it was 67 years later and I was waking up in New York, but not the New York I had called home."

"Why were there never any more super soldiers made when the serum was clearly a success?" Jerry asked.

"The Army would have if they'd had the means to, but the day Dr Erskine and Howard Stark enhanced me, the creator of the serum, Dr Erskine, was murdered by Hydra. No one knew how to recreate the serum because he never wrote the formula down in its entirety. There have been many attempts since then, but nothing that ever worked the same was as it worked on me."

"Did you ever think about having a civilian life?"

"And miss all of this excitement? I don't know how to be a civilian anymore than you do, Jake."

"I suppose not," he said with a smile. "I suck at being a civ. It's nice to pretend sometimes, but when there's too much time between missions I get the itch to be doing something. Wanderlust, I guess. I'm not the kind to put down roots, at least not yet."

"Well, that explains why you haven't complained about how much we're gone." I picked the pen back up to finish off the cards so I could check my messages from Nat. "We've got a couple more hours before the rest of the intel comes in, so make sure you all get something to eat and get caught up while we're somewhere with secure wifi connections."

"Sure thing, Cap," Jake said, taking the hint.

"We'll leave you to it." Mike said, heading back to the card game.

I had just finished signing them all when Skye came and sat down in the booth across from me with a laptop and headphones. She'd changed her outfit to something more girly and done her hair up.

"Thought you might need this to watch your messages."

"Thanks, Skye. So do I get to see the video you took of me earlier today?"

"Yup. It's pulled up already. It wasn't anything bad, it just looked hilarious, Simmons controlling you like a big puppet. So have you read Harry Potter? You said disapparated earlier."

"Yes, I have. I've seen all of the movies other than the one that's still in theaters."

"Never would have guessed you were a Potterhead. Which book's your favorite?"

"The first one. You?"

"The last one. It has a good ending. Not happy, but good. I can take those back to Coulson if you're done with them. He doesn't like to let them out of his sight for long." I handed her the cards and pen with a smile. She glanced through them before looking up at me. "Did you put in a good word for me?"

"Don't think I need to." I gestured at the group surreptitiously staring at her while pretending to play cards and lowered my voice. "Right now you could have your pick of the litter; you do know you're a very pretty girl, Skye?"

"It's always nice to hear," she said with a smile. "I'll get that from you at planning later, okay?" she indicated the laptop and I nodded, hiding my amusement as every guy in the room followed her with their eyes as she walked out of the room.

I raised my voice. "Agent Skye is off limits unless you want to be pulling picket duty in Alaska for the next couple of years." I looked around, meeting my men's eyes. "Treat her like you would Agent Evans because she's one of Evan's close friends and you all know how she deals with people that piss her off."

"Copy that, Captain. Your girl, she don't mess around," Mike said, finally closing his mouth. His jaw had actually dropped when he'd caught sight of Skye.

"No, she doesn't, Mike." I opened the laptop and put on the headphones, letting them get back to their leisure time. Skye was right, it was pretty funny seeing little tiny Jemma Simmons directing me like a puppet while still chattering with Fitz. I watched the video once more as I inserted the thumb drive Phil had given me earlier.

After entering my password, a box opened, showing two files. I clicked on the first one and Sarah showed up on my screen, smiling happily and telling me not to worry. She had to leave for her own mission and she wasn't sure when she'd be back, but she had Clint, Bobbi, and Tripp with her, among others. I replayed it just to hear her voice and see her beautiful face; she didn't often leave me this kind of message, but I appreciated when she did. I never had as much time alone with her as I would have liked, but that was the nature of our job.

The next message was audio only from Nat, filling me in on how Clint and Sarah's mission was going so far because she knew I'd want to know. She ended by saying she'd be meeting us at the rendezvous point tomorrow.

 

 


	31. Making Plans

Brazil   
Sarah's POV

On the way back to our rooms, I captured footage of our empty rooms to use for looping and jammed the bugs so we'd be able to talk privately. I messaged Hunter and Bobbi, telling them to meet in our room and showed it to Clint, who nodded. We all walked into mine and Clint's room and they looked at me. I waited a moment until the door was closed and Tripp and Ward had taken up their positions in the hallway.

"I have the video on loop and only static's coming from the bugs. What is the plan for the next two days?"

"We will be mostly be inside because of the weather, probably drinking and playing cards in the afternoons. In the mornings, Hunter and I will be doing some training while you ladies work on getting info from their women," Clint stated quietly.

"Malika already confirmed that all three Middle Easterners are Ten Rings members," I said, earning a few raised eyebrows. "And to top it off - Sahib is in charge of them now. Did you learn anything useful from the men?"

"Only that there's some need for what we're selling," said Clint, rubbing his temples. "Some of the buyers coming in are not Ten Rings and they intend to outbid the others. If this were a normal deal, I'd be worried about a double cross just because of the stakes involved."

"Same here," said Hunter, crossing his arms. "We aren't exactly known for having a lot of brawn behind us. This cargo will raise some eyebrows, and not only because of the escort."

"This truce between Cesar and the new Sahib - is it legit?" Bobbi asked

"We'll see what happens," replied Clint. "I knew him when he was very young. He's very different from his father and is used to working for what he wants. Word is that he's well connected – his mother's tribes all back him as well as his wife's people. He's very charismatic and intelligent – you saw how he worked the room today. He's a little hot-tempered, but it's still excused on the basis of his youth."

"Khan?" I asked.

"I'd trust an adder before I'd trust him," Hunter remarked.

"I fully expect him to try to get revenge for the set-down I gave him today." said Clint. "I'm not convinced his loyalties truly lie with the Rings. He seems more like he's working for his own profit."

"He still wants you bad, Maria," said Bobbi. "I don't know what he's planning, but take care around him."

"I can handle myself," I said, rolling my eyes.

"Just remember to be helpless," Hunter said. I stuck my tongue out at him childishly.

"Release the CC loop and bugs," Clint ordered with a grin. "Keep up the good job, people - only two more days to go."

"Ten seconds," I said, tapping at my phone. The loop dropped and we walked into the room. "Look at this radar. I can't believe how fast this storm blew in, Ronin."

"Yeah," said Clint. "They really need the rain here, though. It's been rather dry for the past two months." He shrugged his jacket off and set it on a chair.

"Oh goody," said Bobbi. "That means it's going to be a sticky, muddy mess. I _hate_ the mud here."

"I'm just glad we're not halfway up a mountain this time for an acquisition. Remember Columbia a couple years back?" said Hunter, shivering involuntarily. Bobbi's face softened as she put her arms around him and he pulled her close, burying his face in her long hair.

"I hope to never have to see that up close again." Clint's face was bleak as I came up to him, placing one hand alongside his face, the other on his chest. His haunted eyes met mine. "We were less than 10 feet away from being swept down the mountain in a mud slide from the flooding. If I hadn't tied off moments before and swung us over, we wouldn't have made it." He put one hand over mine and brought it to his lips, pressing a kiss to my palm as he pulled me to his chest.

"You shouldn't tell me these things, Ronin! It only makes me want you to be done with this kind of business sooner. You _told_ me this is your last deal," I said, improvising. 

"And it will be, 'Ria." He kissed my forehead. "It's not like I can control the weather."

"Why not?" I grumbled. "You control everything else. I'm going to go crazy! Can I exercise somewhere tomorrow?"

"Who says you need to wait for tomorrow?" Clint said, kissing my neck.

Bobbi laughed and shoved Hunter towards their door as Clint scooped me up and tossed me on the bed. I heard the door click shut as I kicked off my shoes and flopped back. I rolled out of the way as Clint started to fall on me but he pinned me to the bed anyway.

"You'd think we got enough exercise earlier, 'Ria." His voice was husky as he leaned down to kiss me, his weight pressing me into the bed.

"Never, Ronin. I can't get enough of you."

I wrapped my legs around him and rubbed against his hard erection, sliding easily over the fine material of his evening clothes. He groaned as his lips captured mine and I just let myself enjoy the experience. He was gentler than he'd been previously, just kissing and lightly skimming my skin until I was almost overstimulated.

I pulled his dress shirt off and ran my hands over the muscles of his back, working my fingers under his waistband to convince him to take his pants off. I laughed when he couldn't figure out how to get my dress off.

"If you don't want me to destroy it, help me get it off you," he growled impatiently. I quickly shifted so he could see the hidden buttons; I actually really liked this dress. He pulled it off me and threw it on the floor, leaving me in just my boyshort underwear. "You should wear these more often, 'Ria - I do like these panties."

He raised himself up into pushup position to hover over me, just barely touching me; his smirk told me he knew exactly what he was doing, making me feel so much from just this. I tugged again at his pants.

"Take them off already, sir."

"No. I give the orders, babydoll."

He captured my lips, deepening the kiss, tangling his tongue with mine. I nipped his lip and he kissed down my neck, working his way lower. I moaned as he gave my breasts attention, sucking, nipping and blowing on them as I wriggled against him. He moved lower, tracing my ribs with his tongue, making me jump when he nipped at the sensitive spot at my hipbone. My breath caught as he continued to go lower still, settling himself between my thighs. He blew a stream of cool air across the heated skin of my belly, startling a laugh from me.

He peeled my underwear off and tossed them behind him, glancing up at me before he reached down and parted my curls. I wasn't sure about this, and it must have showed in my face. He came back up to me and kissed me leisurely, working down my jaw so he could speak quietly to me.

"If you don't want to try this, blink once for stop, twice for yes," he said so quietly I almost couldn't hear him.

I nodded as he pulled back to see my face, blinking twice. I ran my fingers through his hair before lightly running them over his arms. I closed the distance between us, kissing him boldly. He worked his way back down me again and I watched as he parted my curls and brought his mouth down over my clit, licking and sucking the little nub.

I gasped at the intense sensations, writhing as I tangled my fingers in his short blond hair. It didn't take long before I was coming, screaming his codename. He held my hips tightly as I bucked against him until I finally collapsed back against the pillows, trembling and breathless.

He stood up and finished stripping, wiping his face off before coming back up to kiss me, the taste of me still on his lips. It wasn't a bad taste, just unexpected. I tried to reach for his hard cock, but he wouldn't let me, instead pinning my hands above my head and resting his full weight on me, sinking me into the bed.

I could feel his hard length against my belly and I wrapped my legs around him, shifting so I was rubbing my wet cunt against his cock. I felt his muscles quiver as he tried to keep me from moving and he growled against my mouth.

"You're driving me crazy, 'Ria...you're so wet...and hot." His breathing hitched as I moved again, shuddering as my clit was stimulated yet again. I wanted _something_ \- I just wasn't quite sure what yet.

"Only for you, Ronin. Why are you teasing me when I want you so bad?"

I was enjoying watching him fight his need. His eyes were so dark with arousal that I almost couldn't see the blue. I heard voices outside the hallway door, but Ward was informing whoever it was that we were not to be disturbed right now. I knew Clint heard them too because he quickly captured one sensitive nipple with his hot mouth as I arched my back, groaning loudly.

He lengthened his strokes, rubbing himself fully across my clit and cunt as he gave attention to my other nipple. I trembled as I came again, moaning his codename. He caught my lips, holding me tight to him as he collapsed on top of me, pretending to come.

He rasped out my name against my lips, breathing hard as he laid there. Eventually, he rolled us, pulling me into his arms and holding me tightly, running a hand lightly over my hair and back before pressing a kiss to my temple.

I ran my hand over his face, tracing the stark planes of it, trying to read his expression. There was almost certainly something that was going through his head, but I didn't know what he was thinking right now. I wasn't even sure what was going through my head. I felt a little niggle of guilt about doing all of this with Clint when Steve and I weren't to this point. I knew this was different because it was part of our cover, but that didn't alleviate my guilt.

"Let's go get cleaned up before I fall asleep, 'Ria," Clint said as he released me.

We climbed in the shower and rinsed off. I washed my hair and took off my makeup, letting the hot water pound my skin as I thought.

Clint wrapped his arms around my waist, and I leaned into him, resting my head on his chest. He held me tight and I closed my eyes. He tapped my face softly before letting go to sign a question to me.

**_Are you okay?_ **

_I don't know. I'm flipping out a little._ _I just need to get my head in the game again._

**_You're doing great so far, Sarah. The way you play Ria makes it easy for me to respond to you._** I nodded, that was certainly true. I was the opposite of his former partners. **_It's been a nice change - having you here - playing your character the way you do._**

No wonder it seemed like he absorbed the small affections I gave him in this role; that part was new to him. _Can I ask you something?_   I asked, searching his eyes. He nodded. _Will you tell me the truth?_ He nodded again. _Am I reacting the right way?_

He nodded.  ** _Yes -_** ** _it's amazing given your lack of experience._**

A wry smile twisted my lips and I raised my eyebrow. _I know it's what we have to do. I hacked the cameras and from what I saw, we're pretty tame compared to some of the stuff that goes on around here._

He rolled his eyes at me. **_Exactly. Not having sex with my hot woman would focus their suspicion on us more than it already is just because we're outsiders. Can you keep up the pretense for a couple more days?_**

I nodded. _I'll try. Can we talk about this after this mission is over?_

 _ **I was planning on it,**_  he replied with a nod. "To bed with you, woman. You're falling asleep standing up."

"I can't help it you got me so good, Ronin," I sighed. I gave him an evil smirk. "Next time I get to go down on you before you fuck me."

"We'll see about that," he laughed, shaking his head at me. _**Not a chance, kid.**_

_Why not? I want to try it._

"Bed," he ordered, shaking his head at me. _ **I've already corrupted you enough. Cap's gonna kill me.**_

* *

I woke up in the middle of the night; I could hear that it was pouring. I freed myself from Clint's arms and made my way to the window. When I pushed the curtains aside, I couldn't see past the water sheeting down the glass. I saw that Clint was awake as I got back into bed. He smiled as I curled back up next to him.

"Morning. It's not time to get up yet; the storm woke me."

"Is it pouring?" he asked, his voice thick with sleep.

"Yup." I laid my head back on his shoulder, yawning loudly.

"Go back to sleep, babydoll," he murmured, kissing my bare shoulder.

*    *

"What are we doing today?" I asked when he finally woke up again, setting my phone down. I stretched languidly before climbing on him and giving him a gentle kiss. 

"We haven't had a day all to ourselves in a long time. There's nothing planned for today anyway, so we might as well make the most of it."

"You don't hear me protesting."

"Good."

I leaned down and kissed him again before collapsing bonelessly on him, just letting myself enjoy the moment. Surreptitiously, I captured a video loop of us laying on the bed together when I took over our cameras and jammed the bugs.

"So what are we really doing today? I have control right now."

"Do we have any messages?"

"Just one. Skye says she's almost done with the tracking Trojan and that they'll be able to bring the plane in tomorrow since the storm is finally moving away from here. When will negotiations start?"

"Tonight for the prelims, maybe."

"Why are they competing if they are all on the same side?"

"For some, old habits die hard. For others, they are not truly 'in' yet. Keep playing your part and keep your ears sharp tonight."

"I will. They don't know I speak all of their languages, but they know you do. The women really don't know a lot about what's going on here. They know a little, but not very much."

"They're not meant to be partners, like you or Bobbi. They're meant to be arm trophies and eye candy. I know that it's hard for you to act like that, but you're doing great. Just one more day and we can head home."

"Can't wait. Releasing the loop," I said, resuming my previous position.

The rest of the day passed uneventfully. It poured all day, making the men restless as they all glanced out the windows off and on. We watched the men drink and play cards before changing for dinner. As far as I could tell, there weren't any major negotiations going on yet; more of a jockeying for position than anything else.

Everyone retired early, the increased force of the storm putting even me on edge. Clint and I only slept that night; I gave him the acceptable excuse of having a headache from the storm - it had been thundering all day. In reality, we were both just worn out from a long day of waiting.

 

*    *     *

Steve's POV

A couple hours later, just as I was finishing supper, Skye came to get me.

"Romanoff's on the line for you, Steve."

"Did the latest images come through yet?" I asked, standing up and putting my empty dishes in the bussing box.

"Any time now. You bringing anyone else?" she asked, looking around the room, suddenly seeing she was the center of attention.

"Just McCartney," I said, seeing that he wasn't done eating yet, having just went back for another helping of casserole. "Come in as soon as you finish eating, Jake. We'll be going over the latest images and I'd like to hear your opinion."

"Sure, Cap," he saluted. "Be there in a couple minutes."

After working with Jake for the past month, I had a solid read on him and wanted to know what he thought of the plan. He'd been in the Marines before joining Shield, so he was a decent strategist, and he knew how the enemy would react, having been doing this for several years now.

While all the other guys would fall in with whatever we came up with; Jake liked to know what he was up against ahead of time when it was possible, and I respected that. Phil and May were already waiting for us with Natasha there through FaceTime.

"Hey Nat, are you ready for some excitement tomorrow?" I asked, giving her a grin.

"You bet. I'd be there now if I didn't have to bring the rest of the Strike guys with me. Didn't think Phil wanted that much company on his bus."

"I share, Natasha," Phil said, sounding affronted.

"I know - but I don't trust some of them, so they aren't coming anywhere near you, Coulson. The guys Steve has with him have all been vetted by me and Evans. They're cleared, the rest aren't."

"I agree with Natasha," May said, giving Coulson a look just as Jake walked in. I introduced Jake as my second for our unit and he greeted everyone politely.

"Good to see the rumors weren't true, sir. We need more guys like you." Jake clearly knew who Coulson was, but he just grinned and gave me a look. "Don't worry - I'll keep my yap shut, Cap."

It was a good thing that we'd waited for better satellite feed before finalizing our plans. Hydra had been busy recently, adding in gates, cameras, and more guards - a lot more guards. Skye hacked into their camera feed so we could see what the view looked like from each one.

"Once you guys are in place, I can loop the feed so they don't see you closing in. I don't know how long it will work for; it just depends on how fast they notice it."

"Looks like shift change is at 7 and 7 for the most part. There's the duty roster on that wall there. The camera picks up some of the wall because they didn't want to mount it externally," May said, pointing at one segment.

"Looks like they've added staff recently, that board wasn't made for that many names," Jake said. "They've scribbled them in smaller to make them all fit."

"Those gates weren't on the blueprints we saw earlier," I said. "They've added another section of wall to enclose that field. Must be storing something there they want access restricted to – no exterior gate in that part."

"Can you find any trace of those weapons we saw earlier, Skye?" Coulson asked, crossing his arms and sitting back in his chair.

"I'll need to flip through the feeds. Everyone pick a couple screens to watch while I rewind and fast forward through the past day or so. There's probably not more than a day's worth of footage at any given time, based on what I'm seeing."

We each chose two adjacent cameras to watch while Skye worked her magic.

"Stop!" Phil said suddenly. "Back it up a little bit on cameras 9 and 11. Right there."

"That's a lot of weapons," Skye said. "I wonder where they made them – because it wasn't here."

"She's right; there's nothing to indicate manufacture or assembly. This is a warehouse." May said, tapping the screen that showed a large, open area with large amounts of stacked crates.

"Not warehouse, distribution center." I realized. "If you map out the locations of the other Hydra bases we've taken over the past month, they're all within a day's drive of here."

"Did you find any of these weapons at those bases?"

"No, not a single one," Jake said, shaking his head. "Only regular guns, rifles, that kind of thing. I've never seen anything like those ones."

"Jake, would you say that all the other bases were lightly manned?"

"Yes, we took most of them without even firing a shot," Jake said as he nodded. "Child's play, really."

"I think from the looks of this base," I said slowly, "those were all minor distractions, meant to keep us busy and not focused on the big picture. In 70 years, Hydra's mission has never changed."

"They're gonna try to take over the world, aren't they?" Skye asked, looking over at me with big eyes.

"Isn't that always the evil plan?" Jake said, grinning at her. "I love my job."

"Pretty much," I agreed. "That's why we're called Shield."


	32. Wheels Up

Sarah's POV

After getting up and getting ready for the day, we packed everything up and set our bags together for one of the guards to take to the jet when it landed. I anticipated a hot evac, so I wanted as much lined up ahead of time as possible. Ideally, the plan would go off without a hitch, but I wasn't counting on it - things had been going too smooth so far.

Negotiations with this many parties were quite interesting, I decided. Each of the regional leaders was acting for himself; we also had a handful of individual mercenaries that were interested in the goods, not all of them there in person. Some were attending by teleconference and some sent underlings in because they were leery of having too many high value people together in one place should the authorities show up. Webs didn't always catch every fly.

Cesar and Vidente assured them the compound was secure and that they had people in with the Brazilian Police. The compound was actually quite difficult to find if you didn't know what you were looking for; luckily the line I encrypted into their security system included a GPS signal that broadcasted intermittently.

I sat on Clint's lap, running my hand over his arm as I chattered with Bobbi. Finally, everyone was present and Clint patted my butt so he could stand. I tapped at my tablet while he spoke to the crowd, opening a program that would prevent any notifications from showing up on the screen while I was taking over the large TV on the wall. I was also doing a one way audio broadcast to Natasha of whatever the tablet picked up. It wasn't going to be high quality audio, but it was better than nothing.

"Just so we are clear," said Clint, speaking precisely. "Due to the varied native languages, English is the only language that will be used for bidding; Euros will be the only currency." There were several heads nodding. The Euro was currently higher than almost any other form of currency right now. 

"Payment will be wire-transferred to an offshore account via link sent only to the buyer. My pilot will not land until both my associate and I contact him with confirmation. Once an offer has been accepted, payment is due on acceptance of the cargo following inspection, should the buyer wish to inspect before accepting." He nodded to me and I transferred the pictures to the flat screen monitor through Bluetooth.

"For those of you not physically present or without representatives in this room, a web-link has been sent to the email addresses provided by our hosts that contains these pictures as well as additional specifications. If you have not received it in the next five minutes, please inform me and I will have it resent to the address you provide."

Hunter tapped at his phone and sent the prebuilt link Shield had given him. Built into the weblink was an undetectable tracing program that Skye had built that would leave a window open to each computer that accessed the link. It was an ingenious little thing that was going to make Shield's job a hell of a lot easier on the cleanup side. I heard several notifications go off in the room as the people present received the link as well. 

"Bidding will start in 15 minutes," Clint finished. "Which is 1200 BST Rio de Janeiro. Opening bid will start at  € 100 million (Euro)."

There was a flurry of conversation among the buyers as Clint sat down, pulling me back onto his lap. He smiled, running his fingers lightly over my face before pulling me in for a kiss with a finger under my chin, reminding me to play my part.

"What do you think, 'Ria?"

"These Stark things better bring enough so we don't have to do this again for a long time."

"That's the plan. You want me home; now I'll be there. I'll be around so much you're going to get sick of me."

I laughed and kissed him lightly. "Never, Ronin. I could never get sick of having you around. No more long absences chasing the next big deal, leaving me home with just Natalia for company. We can finally have a family of our own."

I played it up big time. Some of the buyers were listening with half an ear while they studied the fake spec sheets Tony had made for us. He placed his hand lightly on my flat belly. I covered it with my own and kissed him. I blinked up at him from under my lashes, smiling coyly. It took him a moment to pull himself together before he kissed me again. 

"Sounds good to me," he murmured against my lips.

Hunter cleared his throat and I stood up, waiting for Clint to stand before I tapped the tablet and cleared the pictures from the screen, putting the opening bid of €100 million on it. Talk in the room slowly died down as the start time approached.

"Gentlemen, the bidding is now open," Hunter announced at noon. "Good luck."

I sat down at the table, fingers tapping as the bids came in quickly. Cesar was the first to drop out of the bidding, but others started dropping out one by one after the price passed €500 million. All of the Middle Easterners were still competing against each other, along with two of the remote buyers and one representative on his phone.

One of Vidente's people came up and whispered in his ear and there was an alarmed look on his face. He turned to Cesar and said something to him quietly, causing a brief flash of annoyance to cross his face. I assumed the Federales were on the move and Vidente's contact had told them they were on their way. I took a second to tap one letter, 'V', on Clint's hand in the guise of excitement over the bidding. His eyes flashed to Vidente in time to see the exchange and flash a grin at me.

At €1 billion, only two were left, a remote buyer and Sahib. Sahib ended up winning the lot for a cool €1.4 billion and was ready to go higher. Bobbi messaged the team that the sale was done, their cue to be ready for anything.

"Thank you, gentlemen for your participation today," Hunter said as I disconnected from the screen.

Once the room cleared, Sahib came over to us. "Have your pilot land here. My men will be ready to inspect the cargo before I approve the transfer."

Clint nodded to Sahib and raised his phone to his ear. Someone picked up and he gave them clearance to land at the base. Hunter then called someone and gave them the go ahead. I handed Tripp my tablet and tucked my phone into my bra, really missing my pockets about now. The men turned to go out to the airstrip, with Tripp, Ward, and Sahib's personal guards flanking us. Clint kept one arm protectively around my waist. Bobbi and Hunter were walking hand in hand, talking quietly together.

The other middle Easterners met us at the airstrip, their planes all ready for takeoff. Our private jet was just landing vertically and Sahib stared at it with interest. "I see now why the price was so high for this Stark tech if this is how you like to travel, Ronin."

"My 'Ria likes the best, Sahib." Clint pulled me close, kissing my temple. "$250 million and worth every penny. This is the smoothest flying, most maneuverable jet I own. Cloaking, undetectable, fully weaponized – top of the line. You should look into getting one for yourself."

"I will keep that in mind." His eyes moved back to us.

I smiled up at Sahib from within Clint's arms. "Is Malika already on your plane, Sahib? I didn't get a chance to say goodbye."

"Yes, she was quite tired this morning. The storm kept her up most of the night; we do not get rain like this back home."

"I suppose not. Will you tell her I'll call her soon?" I smiled widely, looking at him from under my lashes.

He nodded. "I will, Maria. She said she greatly enjoyed your company."

"I enjoyed hers as well. If we ever find ourselves in your part of the world, you better let us get together for a girl's night before that baby comes."

"Malika would like that. If you will excuse me, I must direct my men." He bowed slightly, walking away from us.

I nodded, leaning into Clint and looking away from Sahib. "Ten bucks says that none of those crates go on his plane."

"You're on. You think he'll trust Khan and Shah to deliver them?"

"Not really, but he won't want anything dangerous on board with his newly pregnant wife."

The look he gave me was mildly skeptical, but I was right. After a short time looking over the goods while Strike 1 and 2 looked on, acting like hired muscle, Sahib nodded and pulled out his phone. Clint's phone dinged as the wire transfers started coming into the dummy account from some of Sahib's holdings. Clint signaled to the Strike teams and they backed away so Sahib's men could load the crates on Shah and Khan's planes. I saw Shah boarding his plane, so I knew where he was. Khan, on the other hand, was still on the runway, not far from me.

Rumlow called for Clint's attention and he turned to go over to the team. I palmed a small knife from one of his hidden pockets as he paused to stroke my face and gesture to Tripp. I gave him my best innocent smile as he turned to leave me standing alone with just Tripp to watch me.

As I expected, moments after Clint had his back to me, Khan was striding up to me. His man disarmed Tripp faster than I thought he would and held a gun to his head. Khan reached his hand out to me and I watched the surprise on his face as I set the knife to his neck, resting just over the jugular.

"You were warned already, Khan. Was Ronin's warning not clear enough for you?"

"Such spirit in a beautiful woman is admirable. You will be an excellent addition to my palace, Maria."

"Ronin will not let you take me."

I could see that Strike 1 and 2 were moving into position, Clint at point. I glanced at Tripp, knowing I could take out the guard on him. He nodded, dropping quickly as I threw my knife, the force of my throw burying it deep into the man's neck before pivoting to punch Khan with enough force to knock the wind out of him as it threw him back onto the tarmac. Khan stared up at me dazedly as I placed the spike of my heel on his jugular, pressing down enough to keep him from trying to rise.

"Miss Maria, let Ronin handle this now," Tripp said as he pulled me back just before Clint rested his sword on Khan's throat, keeping him from rising. Blood ran down his neck from the shallow slice the blade had made.

Sahib came running, having noticed the commotion. "What did the barbarian do now, Ronin?" He asked in rapid Arabic. "I did not see."

"This son of a whore," Clint gestured at Khan rudely, answering in Arabic, "dares to put his hands on _my woman_ despite haven been given a warning that I would cut off the offending hand should he do so again."

Sahib looked down at the prone man with undisguised anger. This was not the first time Khan had unwisely angered Sahib, I gathered. His anger was not surface temper, it was harnessed rage.

"Khan, you would jeopardize the Master's plan for a woman? Any punishment the Master gives you will have been earned by you alone." Fear entered Khan's eyes, and I wondered what kind of punishment would make that happen.

"As much as I'd like to see you cut off his hand, Ronin," I said in Portuguese, pretending not to follow the conversation, "the moron didn't actually touch me." I was giving him an out, but I didn't think he could take it. For Ronin to make a threat and not carry through with it would undermine his reputation.

Clint switched back to Portuguese for the act. "His intentions were clear, 'Ria. By attacking your guard the minute my back was turned, he was going to take you from me. I won't allow that to happen - not so long as there is breath in my body."

"Yes, Ronin, that was his intent," Tripp agreed. "I heard him say as much to her."

"If you choose to take his hand in punishment, Ronin, I will not stay your blade." Sahib said in Arabic, thinking I wouldn't understand. "A thief must be marked as such as a warning to others."

"Tripp, take Maria to the jet," Clint ordered as he gave me a look that was easy to understand. _Get moving_. Tripp put his arm around me and steered me swiftly to the waiting jet, but not before I heard him reply to Sahib. "Yes, he must be."

"Faint, kid," said Tripp quietly as we heard a metallic clang and a scream.

I dropped obligingly, letting myself become dead weight. Tripp caught me, easily scooping me up in his arms and carrying me onto the jet. Warning sirens were going off, and I guessed that the Shield and Federal Police teams were close enough that the lookouts could see them with their scopes. He set me down in a seat and handed me a com before sliding into the pilot's seat. Bobbi was already in the copilot chair.

I tapped my phone, starting the remote timers on the sonic weapons. "T minus five minutes to sonic blast. Wheels up in three. Move it people!"

I looked out through the tinted glass at the group outside. The sirens had made them all rush to their planes. Sahib's men were dragging Khan to his plane as Sahib raced to his own jet. I saw two other jets taking off and assumed that they were Cesar's and Shah's. Boots pounded up the ramp as our teams loaded up.

"Take us to the drop point, Tripp. Evans, time?" Clint demanded as he closed the ramp behind him - he was the last one to board.

"One minute, thirty seconds to blast. I recommend activating ear protection, there's no guarantee we'll have reached sufficient buffer distance before detonation."

"Will the jet shield us?" asked Rumlow, still staring at me in my skimpy outfit. The rest of the Strike guys turned their attention from me when I met their eyes briefly. I crossed my legs and arms, leaning back into my seat as the jet took off vertically.

"Somewhat, Fitz wasn't sure to what degree. I'll let you know shortly."

I took out my earrings and handed them to Clint, who frowned at me, knowing what that meant. He opened his hand to show Hunter when he gave Clint a curious look before gaping at me.

"I hope you know what the hell you're doing, Evans." Hunter said.

I nodded; I'd be without auditory protection from the sonic blast, but at this point, I wasn't going to be playing an active part, so if I was incapacitated for an hour, it wouldn't matter. "Thirty seconds."

"Strike, two minutes to the drop point," said Bobbi over our coms. "Strap in, it might get a little rough when that thing goes off."

Buckles clicked in around me and I fastened my harness. We should be far enough away that the Quinjet wasn't going to be affected, but it was going to be close.

I watched my timer on my phone. "Ten seconds. Five, four, three, two, one." There was a short delay, but within seconds the jet hit some rough turbulence from the blast. Clint and Hunter looked at me, but I didn't feel any different. Then the sonic wave hit the jet and I struggled to keep consciousness, not entirely successfully. Hunter took my phone from my hand and I felt Clint's hand on my chin to keep my head from flopping. I sat up again when I woke up, having slouched in my seat. Hunter relaxed and handed me back my phone.

Clint looked at me for a long moment. "Evans, how do you feel?"

I took stock before answering. "Fine. How long was I out for?"

"30 seconds, tops," Clint said, sitting back in his seat. "You were in and out for less than a minute before blacking out."

I grinned at Clint. "Well, that wasn't too terrible. I wonder-"

He cut me off with a look. "No, Sarah, you will not test it on yourself at full power."

"Today," I agreed. His look got sterner, so I changed the subject. "I would hate to be closer than that in the jet, though. Did we lose power?"

"No, but it was a close thing," Bobbi said from up front.

"Looks like we are going to need better sonic shields after all," I mused. Fitz was going to be a little out of his league with this.

"Do those exist?" Tripp asked.

"Not yet," I laughed, "but Tony could use a project that doesn't involve his suits right now."

"I take it you're asking him?" Clint said. "If it affected you like that, I wonder what it would have done to the rest of us."

"You'd still be out for a while yet. Tony might even bump it to the top of the list if I ask really nicely."

"I hope so," Bobbi grumbled. "It wasn't something I care to try again if I don't have to."

"Was anyone else affected?"

"No," Clint said with a smirk. "Everyone else had their ear protection in like good agents."

"You can't tell me you weren't a _little_ curious as to what would happen?"

"Not _that_ curious." He smiled at me as we began our descent. "You better tell Steve we're on our way back. Nat said they'd be back before us."

"I will as soon as we drop off the Strike teams for cleanup duty."

Clint saw my eyes flick to Rumlow and nodded. He knew I didn't care for the man. I worked with him when I had to, but something about him rubbed me the wrong way - and it wasn't just how much of a jerk he came off as to the female Agents.

"I don't know about you guys, but I'm ready for some R & R."

"A vacation from your vacation?" Hunter teased.

"A real vacation - somewhere with room service and no one staring at me like I'm a piece of meat." 

 

*   *   *

Steve's POV

I'd talked to Sarah briefly before we boarded the Quinjet, she'd called to say they were headed back to the States, but wouldn't be in DC until later tonight because they needed to drop off part of their team first before heading home. If all went as planned, we'd be back around the same time as Clint and Sarah - maybe even a little before.

"We're 10 minutes out, Steve. Switching to secure channel 7," Natasha informed me over my com, waking me from my reverie.

I'd been mentally examining the plan, making sure we had all the gates covered. We needed to take this base today to prevent widespread distribution of those highly dangerous weapons. It would have been nice to have the whole team here, but sometimes it just wasn't feasible; we couldn't postpone this strike even one day to get Bruce, Clint and Sarah here.

"What's Tony's ETA?"

"I'm already at the landing point, Capsicle. Nat, you're clear here. No heat signatures detected."

"Thanks, Tony. Good luck out there today and watch your six."

"You too, Cap. See you in a few."   

"Over." I muted my com so I wouldn't shout in Nat's ear by addressing the men. "Pilot says were at t-minus 10 til landing. Com check on channel 7." I gave them a moment to switch over before starting the countoff. All coms worked, so I went live again and gave my instructions over them. "We're going to be cutting it close by the time we get into position, so is everyone clear on our job today?" I asked, looking around the Quinjet at the men. Most of them were nodding, this was something we had been doing a lot lately, infiltrating Hydra bases. "Any questions?"

"We're good, Cap. You've got the fun job today," Mike said, leaning back in his seat.

"First in, last out isn't exactly what I'd call fun, Mike," I said as I pulled on my leather gauntlets.

"Cap, you gunna leave a couple for us this time or you gunna hog 'em all again?" Jerry asked, flashing a wide grin as the guys next to him elbowed him and whacked him on the back.

"I'm sure there'll be plenty to go around at this place. As I recall, you guys got the lion's share the other day while I was stuck doing IT work," I replied, grinning at the younger man.

"Yeah, that was a great day," Jerry said. "Too bad you missed out, Johnny."

"I'm guessing today will be a little more work than the last one," Johnny said, rolling his eyes at his buddy.

"Expect heavy resistance this time," I said. "They aren't going to just hand over those weapons and file into holding cells."

"A guy can dream, Cap!" Mike said as the others groaned, stopping him before he could get started.

"Check your gear, make sure you're ready to move when we touch down. Keep the line clear until Agent Romanoff gives the go-ahead," I ordered, mentally rolling my eyes at his enthusiasm. He was a good kid, but he tended to get carried away if I didn't refocus his energies.

"Yes, sir!" they all chorused, becoming more serious.

Every man had his own pre-fight routine, including me. I double checked my weapons, making sure they were secure and latched into their holsters before closing my eyes and clearing my mind, walking through the plan in my mind one more time to be sure I didn't miss anything.

We were going in just after dawn when the sun would be shining directly into half of the surveillance cameras and the guards would be changing shifts. We were splitting our forces to use a pincer attack against the base to eliminate any possibility of Hydra escaping with the weapons. There were only two gates, so that made our job easier.

I felt the surge in my adrenaline when the Quinjet jolted us; Natasha was switching it over for a vertical landing. She landed the aircraft smoothly and opened the ramp for us to offload. Jake and Mike went out first, checking the perimeter. The rest followed when he gave the all-clear. Natasha and I were the last ones off the jet.

"I bet I get more guys than you today," she said, giving me a sassy smirk as we walked down the ramp.

"I'm not taking that bet. What do you think I am, some kind of rookie?"

"Nope, just wanted to see what you would say." I gave her a look and she shrugged. "Ready to decide which kids are your favorites?"

"I don't have favorites, Nat; we're all on the same team here, you know?" I said, exasperated.

"I have favorites," Natasha said, arching an eyebrow at me. "Their names are Glock and Luger."

I snorted, but didn't bother to respond to that. Nat was doing her best to goad me today and I wasn't taking the bait. "Divide up into your teams, you know which one you're on." The men nodded and quickly moved to stand either by Tony or behind me and Nat. "Those of you with me, let's move out! We're burning daylight."

"McCartney, lead our guys to the observation point and I'll meet you there. Cap, let me know when you're in position."

I signaled my agreement as we turned and headed out, the men falling in behind us.

"Roger that, Stark. Fall in behind me and move out!" Jake ordered, heading the other direction.

We jogged at a normal human pace to our predetermined strike point.

"Natasha, let Skye know we're approaching the target, so it's time for her to go to work."

"Roger that, Rogers," Nat said with a smartass grin, having already switched to the channel Skye was on. "Come in Skye. Yes, that's how I always talk to him."

"Romanoff!" I glared at her, but it was true. She really did talk to me like that, only not over our coms when it wasn't just the Avengers.

"You ready to do your thing?" Natasha motioned for us to halt, so I slowly stopped. "All right. We're on Channel 7 if you need to reach us and remember the whole team will hear you, not just us. Romanoff out." Natasha switched back over to our channel before speaking. "Camera's are capturing loop, so stay put for 90 seconds."

I glanced at my watch, signaling Nat when time was up. "Clear. Heading to target." We started jogging again, this time only stopping when we reached the wall around the base. "Tony, we're in launch position."

"Go ahead, Cap," Tony said.

I nodded to Natasha and crouched slightly as I laced my fingers together. We'd practiced this maneuver before, but had never done it on a mission. She took out her guns and backed up for a short run before I launched her easily over the wall. I heard a couple shots before she spoke.

"Courtyard clear, heading to the gate."

I ran around to meet her while my men followed behind, keeping an eye out for sentries. The gate slid open easily and I went in first to keep guard while the men all ran in and took cover.

"Tony, we're in," I said, looking around.

"We are, too. I'm not seeing anyone moving around on this side, are you?"

"Not very many," Natasha said as she took out another guard who walked too close to where we were hiding. "I'm not liking the looks of this, Cap."

"Me neither. Clear the outbuildings and then head for the main building, like we planned. Mike, Jerry, sweep the perimeter, check the vehicles."

"Copy that, Cap."

They peeled off to do what I asked as we moved to the outbuilding. The door was unlocked, so I went in, leaving Natasha to cover me. The others headed over to the other two sheds on our half of the compound, splitting up to clear them. I took out four total, piling them up at the doorway.

"Clear," I said, leading Nat over to where our men had met up.

"Perimeter clear," she said. "Reports?"

"Vehicles clear."

"Shed one clear."

"Shed two clear."

This was too easy, it had to be a trap of some sort and I knew we were all thinking it. The radio chatter from Tony's group was coming up the same way, except for the main building.

"Cap, I got a lot of heat signatures coming from that main building."

"And here I was starting to think we had the wrong address," I said, just as men started pouring from the doors and windows of the building like rats deserting a sinking ship. We took cover as they started to open fire and I charged the machine gunner pinning down Jake. Natasha and the others covering me as I took him out. The rest all became a blur as we fought back.

For the most part, things were going as planned, but I suddenly found myself hard pressed to keep our part of the charge moving forward. I was the target of another concentrated attack, they were pinning me down under their fire. Natasha picked them off when she got a shot until she had taken out all of the snipers.

We could hear fighting on the far side of the base as Tony's group was working their way towards us. Nat and I concentrated on working our way to the reinforced concrete main building, both of us covered by my shield.

"Steve, incoming from behind you!" Natasha cried as she reloaded.

"Where's these guys come from?" I asked as they started firing RPG's at me.

We'd cleared those buildings, there shouldn't have been anyone there to fire at me. I tossed Natasha out of the blast radius before bringing my shield up to deflect most of their rounds into the building, bringing down a section of the wall and spitting concrete at me. I positioned myself for the next round as my team starting picking them off.

More RPG's came from two directions, forcing me to move quickly to deflect them. I almost got them all away from me when one slid past my shield by millimeters, hitting the concrete next to me and exploding. Pain ripped through my body and I gritted my teeth, trying to keep my shield up and stay upright. I missed the next RPG and the resulting explosion threw me into the concrete wall behind me.

"Cap, watch out-" was the last thing I heard before I felt the bomb going off. The ground disappeared from under me and I tried to bring my shield up to cover me, but I was too late. Concrete buried me and all I saw was blackness. The pain was intense, worse than anything I'd ever felt before. I fought to stay awake but I just couldn't...the darkness was calling my name.


	33. Bittersweet

Post Brazil   
Sarah's POV

We were in high spirits as we disembarked from the Quinjet back at the Triskelion. Our mission had been a complete success and I couldn't wait to tell Steve how it had ended. I'd been laughing at something Clint said as we were walking down the ramp when I saw Natasha and Maria Hill coming towards us.

I searched for Steve, knowing he should be here too. He'd said he'd be when I had called him earlier. I took one look at their expressions and my heart froze in my chest. I'd never seen such a blank look on Natasha's face and Maria looked like she'd been crying. I dropped my bag and ran over to them, Clint on my heels.

"What is it, Natasha? Where's Steve?" My eyes flickered back and forth between them and I fought down the panic that was clawing at me as a single tear ran down Maria's face. "Maria - talk to me!"

"Tasha?" said Clint, reaching out to hold her shoulders. He gave her a small shake. "Tasha, what's going on?"

She cleared her throat and spoke in monotone. "Sarah, Steve was badly injured today. He's alive, but we don't know if he's going to make it yet. He still hasn't woken up."

I sprinted for the stairs, not waiting to hear more. I parkoured down to the hospital floor and ran all out until I reached the doors to the ICU. There were two guards stationed outside of a room and Doctor Blake was just walking out the room; he paused when he saw me skid to a stop in front of him.

"Agent Evans; we've been expecting you. Captain Rogers is in here." He turned and led me into the room.

I tried to speak, but nothing came out. I cleared my throat and tried again. "How is he? What happened?"

"He took heavy fire this morning when we were on our way into the base," I heard Tony say as my eyes found Steve.

He was lying in the hospital bed with an oxygen mask on and a bunch of wires running to a bank of monitors. There were splints on both his left arm and leg and red tinged bandages around his torso. He was so pale and still. I took his right hand in mine and it was barely warm, unlike the last time I'd held his hand. I brushed his hair back and kissed his forehead.

"I'm here now, Steve," I whispered, resting my cheek on his. "Don't you _dare_ die on me, Rogers." I kissed his cheek before straightening up again and giving my attention to the doctor, who was watching me with sympathy.

"Captain Rogers broke most of the bones on the left side of his body and took considerable internal damage. He lost a lot of blood before they got him back here. Frankly, Agent Evans, we don't know how he's still alive. We've done everything we could for him already, but as of right now, I'm afraid he won't make it through the night."

"Have you given him blood?" I was reading the numbers on the monitors and they were dropping steadily. It didn't look good. If we couldn't stabilize him, even his super-soldier serum couldn't help him.

"Of course." He pointed to a deflated bag on the IV pole. "Six pints so far and still running. It's helping, but he's still hemorrhaging internally. We can't get it to stop without making things worse; it's slowed substantially since his arrival, at least."

"Give him some of my blood." I met Tony's eyes and he nodded. "I have a similar serum in my veins and I'm a universal donor. It will give him a boost until his own serum production can keep up."

"It certainly can't hurt at this point." He looked over at the nurse by the bed. "Send for a phlebotomist stat." She nodded and moved to leave but I stopped her with a gesture.

"Tell them to just direct line me in. We don't have time to do a transfusion the normal way." The nurse's eyes widened and she quickly left the room.

"Dr Blake, is Dr Banner here?"

"He's on his way to DC. Mr Stark contacted him when Captain Rogers was en route."

"Thank you, Dr Blake. Can you give me a minute with Tony, please?" I looked over at Tony, who was sitting on the other side of Steve with his head in his hands.

"Of course."

I waited for the doctor to step outside and close the door before speaking. I walked over to Tony and put my arms around his neck.

"Papi, what happened? Everything was fine when I talked to him this morning."

Tony wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into his lap. His voice was rough when he finally spoke. "I'm sorry, Sarah. We met heavy resistance at the base. Cap was leading the charge on the other side. Nat said a couple RPG's hit next to him, setting off a bomb we didn't know was there. He was too close to it for us to help him. Thank God he had his shield on him. It stopped the worst of it, but then the concrete building collapsed on him, burying him in the rubble."

"Oh no," I breathed. 

"I dug him out and sent Nat back with him; she did what she could until they got here. If it had been anyone else, they wouldn't have made it even that long."

"Poor Nat."

"I'm so sorry, kitten." He kissed my temple and I blinked rapidly, refusing to give up hope yet.

"Papi, this is _Captain America_ we're talking about; we have to believe that he'll pull through."

"I hope so, Sarah. I hope so. I'm glad you're here now. You know he'd want you here with him.

I heard the door click and he let me go. "I'm going to go get some coffee. You want some?"

"Yeah. I think I need something a little stronger than coffee right now, though."

I looked over just as the phlebotomists came in with direct infusion tubing. One of them lowered Steve's bed down and I came over to his right side. I held out my arms for them to see my veins and the brown haired older lady prodded at the inside of my elbow with her cool fingers.

"Thank goodness you have good veins, Agent. This isn't our normal procedure by any means."

"I understand that. Thank you for being willing to do this for him." A nurse came in with a high stool for me to sit on and placed it next to Steve's bed.

"Thank _you_ for doing this for him, Agent. There's a good chance that this method won't work for very long."

"I have faith in you, ma'am. It's still worth a shot." I perched on it as she tourniqueted my arm and scrubbed it down with alcohol while a man was doing the same for Steve. I held my arm still for her as she prepped the tubing. "It's a straight shot for that vein, just so you know. If you turn, it'll miss."

She smiled at me with amusement, eyes on my arm. "Had enough draws to know that already at your age?"

"Yup. Blood doesn't bother me. I can start it myself if I have to."

"I can guarantee you won't have to; I'm good at what I do," she said as the needle slipped under my skin and slid into the vein.

Dark red started flowing and she let it fill the short tubing before clamping it. She then moved over to Steve. In one quick motion, she slid the needle into Steve's forearm. She patted it to make sure it was in and unclamped the tubing. I started opening and closing my hand and I could see it flowing through the clear tube to him.

The lady placed a piece of tape over it to secure it and then came back to check me, removing my tourniquet. The man handed me a bottle of water and I downed it, knowing I needed to be well hydrated to do this. He took off Steve's tourniquet and retreated to look at the bag of blood hanging behind Steve and running into his other arm.

"Looks like it's working. I'll be back to unhook you in ten minutes. Dr. Blake said no more than a pint for right now."

She gently patted my shoulder and I nodded, looking at Steve. Tony came back with coffee, placing mine on the rolling table before he settled onto the edge of his chair. I kept flexing my hand, keeping the blood going at a good rate. I knew I could get almost two pints in him by the time the phelbotomist came back. I had donated my blood before, enough to know that I averaged a full pint in under 6 minutes. That was a little faster than the average person, but they didn't need to know that. I just hoped my serum would be strong enough to help save him.

Natasha came in quietly and came to stand beside me, one hand on my shoulder. "Bruce will be here in 20 minutes." Thankfully her voice had more tone to it now. "Do you think that'll help? They say they can't get the bleeding under control – it's internal."

I looked up at her and put my hand over hers. "We don't know for sure, but since my serum is a lesser version of Steve's, we hope that it will give him an edge, maybe enough for him to stop hemorrhaging." I squeezed her hand and she looked back at me. "Thanks, Natasha, for bringing him home for me. I'm sure it wasn't easy for you, being the only one with him."

"I thought I lost him a couple times on the way here. Thankfully, Jarvis can do just about everything but land the Quinjet and it's the fastest thing we've got." She paused for a long moment. "It happened so fast, Sarah. He shoved me out of the way, you know, before the blast knocked me out."

She tucked my loose hair behind my ears as I looked back at the tubing to make sure it was still flowing. Opening and closing my hand at a little faster rate, I glanced back up at her. "Somehow I'm not surprised. He can't help but protect the people he cares about. Thanks for having his back."

"Wouldn't have it any other way. I'm surprised that they let you do this that way." She handed me a bottle of water and opened it for me.

"I didn't exactly give them a choice and Tony would have backed me. I would've done it without anyone's permission if I had to. Besides, his numbers have leveled out just since I started." I indicated the monitors that Tony was watching intently. By my calculations, I'd given a pint already. I downed that bottle and gave it back to Natasha to toss. She went to sit in the open chair next to Tony.

"You're right," Tony said. "The only reason Dr Blake agreed to let you do it was because we're out of options."

"Where's Clint?" I asked.

"Debriefing with Fury and Maria. Good job, by the way. I heard you were successful in taking down your base as well."

"Thanks. It helped that they only thought of Bobbi and I as arm candy. We managed to keep all of our covers intact but for the record, I still hate fighting in heels, not that I had to this time."

Natasha actually laughed at that. "Don't we all?"

Tony cracked a smile. "Speak for yourselves. I happen to like watching you fight in heels, Natasha. It's quite a turn on."

"Everything in heels turns you on, Stark."

"I can't deny that statement. It's quite true." Tony sat back with a grin, sounding more like himself.

I smiled and looked back down at Steve. He looked like had a little color now. I reached over to touch his hand with my free hand. He felt a little warmer, too, which gave me hope. I glanced at the clock to see that I only had a little more than a minute before they came back to unhook me.

I thought about asking Natasha to stall them, but I was starting to feel a little light headed. I eased up on the flexing of my hand a bit to let the feeling pass and took a couple of deeper breaths; Steve wouldn't be happy to know I passed out from giving him too much blood. I looked over to see Natasha and Tony studying me - they were watching the clock, too.

Right on time, the brunette came back in the room to unhook us. I let go of Steve so she could clamp the tubing. She removed the needle from me first, so I pressed the cotton ball to my elbow and raised my arm above my head. She gave me a smile and moved over to unhook Steve, sliding the needle out and holding the cotton ball in place for him for a minute. When she was sure it was sealed, she placed a bandage over his puncture mark.

I'd already stopped bleeding by the time I lowered my arm, so I declined the elbow wrap she was going to offer me. She disposed of the tubing in a sharps container and left me with a smile. I took Steve's hand in mine again and looked at his numbers. His oxygen level had increased slightly and his heart rate had steadied, less erratic than before. It was just enough of an improvement that it gave me hope he'd make it.

When Dr Blake came in to reassess Steve; he couldn't believe the improvement in that short amount of time. "Congratulations, Agent Evans. It looks like your idea was an excellent one. His oxygen saturation levels have increased by five points already and his pulse is higher; temperature is almost back in the normal range. He even looks better; the bruising that was on his face when he first came in is gone now, so that's certainly positive."

"When do you think he'll wake up?" Natasha asked. "He's been unconscious for 8 hours now."

Dr Blake straightened and faced her. "That's up to him. While initially it was from the drastic blood loss, I don't think that's the case anymore. I asked Dr Strange to give me his opinion on Captain Roger's initial CT scan and he said that it didn't show any noticeable brain damage."

"Has he had an MRI?"

"Yes, but we'll be taking him for another one to see if there's been internal improvement to his injuries. I understand that his rate of healing has always been quite...rapid."

"Yes," said Bruce, just now coming into the room. "It is. Dr Strange contacted me on my way in and we agree that it is entirely likely that he's now just in a deeper sleep to allow him to heal more fully before waking up. Steve's had minimal sleep in the past two weeks, which might also be a contributing factor."

I made a small noise of disproval and Bruce squeezed my shoulder lightly as he came up next to me. I turned, putting my arms around him; he carefully folded me into his arms. I felt his chest rumble as he spoke over me to the other man. "Thank you for overseeing his care, Dr Blake, until I could get here. I'm only sorry I couldn't get here faster." I felt him shake Dr Blake's hand but didn't raise my head.

"You're welcome, Dr Banner. I'm quite pleased to report that his prognosis looks measurably better than when he first arrived. I'll be in my office if you need me."

Bruce held me at arm's length and looked me over. "How much blood did you give him, Sarah?"

"Feels like 2 pints; maybe a little less. I had them do a direct transfusion since his numbers were dropping so steadily. How'd you know?"

"Tony texted me. Go get something to eat. Natasha, will you stay with her in case she gets light headed?" His eyes flicked over to her and then back at me. I could see her nod out of the corner of my eye.

"Okay...are you mad at me?" I asked quietly.

"No, Sarah. I'm only worried that you gave too much right now. I could never be mad at you for trying to save him." He hugged me briefly and then let me go. "I just need to look him over to see where he's at. Tony will stay and help me assess him through Jarvis until they take him for his scans in a little bit."

"Bring me back something good," said Tony with a smile as he shooed us from the room.

We walked over to the elevator and I leaned on the wall as Natasha gave it our destination. She linked her arm with mine and we walked to the cafeteria.

"You sit and I'll bring you something. You look like you're ready to keel over."

I didn't protest as she led me to a chair. I sank into it and put my head in my hands. I felt a little shaky and my pulse was a little faster than normal. I got a couple of strange glances, but the cafeteria wasn't very busy right now.

"You owe me dinner from my first week still," I replied.

I heard her laugh as she walked away. I looked up again when I smelt peppers. Looks like it was Mexican tonight. I moved my arms out of the way and she slid the tray in front of me. I opened the bottle of orange juice and took a long drink. I set it down to find Natasha looking at me closely.

"So how was Brazil?"

I laughed and picked up my tortilla to take a bite. I chewed slowly and washed it down with a drink of water. "Brazil was...interesting. I can't say I like using that kind of cover, though. I'm not good at being the weak and helpless female. There were a couple of players who wondered where you were, though. We fed them some cock and bull story about you being mad at Clint for taking up with me."

"How do you know I'm not? I've been told I'm pretty feisty even for a redhead."

I laughed. "If that was the case, I'm sure the bags you packed for us would've had slightly different contents. Do you really wear those for pajamas?"

"What are pajamas?" she deadpanned.

"God, Nat! I about had a heart attack once I figured out what those things were."

She laughed for a long moment as I took another couple bites. She almost stopped but then something would set her off again. Finally, she wiped tears from her eyes and held her stomach. "Oh, Sarah, I've missed you. What I wouldn't give to have seen your face that night!"

"I would've throttled you that night." I waved my fork at her menacingly. "Today, not so much. I decided that Steve would probably like them."

She roller her eyes at me. "He's male; _of course_ he'll like them. Clint said you put on pretty convincing performances; Hunter said you're hot and Bobbi punched him - again."

"Hunter saw me naked the second day. We had adjoining rooms and the door didn't latch well."

"Ahh...that makes much more sense now. Were you okay with Clint? He said he tried not to do anything uncalled for."

"I couldn't have done it without him; that took a lot of trust for both of us. It seemed that we did the minimum necessary to achieve the purposes. I mostly just sat on his lap, touched him probably more than was needed, and pretended to adore him like a brainless ditz. He didn't seem to mind," I shrugged and continued eating. The cafeteria's fajitas were surprisingly good.

"Good girl. He said everyone bought act, so you did well there. Clint was concerned that you would be upset by the situation."

"I was more nervous than anything. I really didn't know what to expect or what I was supposed to do. Your file helped - some - and Bobbi let me know I was doing it right, but most of it was over my head."

"Sorry," she winced.

"It's okay, Nat. It's probably good that I went; all the other women there were my age or a year or two older. I know that you could've done it, but Clint also said that after New York you're a little too recognizable anymore."

"True. Most of them never have the same woman with them twice, anyway. Hunter and Bobbi are the only other Shield team that has used their covers together for several years now."

"Is it true they used to be married?"

"Yeah. Bobbi's always done a lot of covert missions – it's her passion. Hunter is a pretty jealous guy when it comes to her, so it just didn't work out but they hook up occasionally, so their performance was probably legit."

"I like Bobbi. I would definitely work with her again."

"And Hunter?"

"Sure, he's quite entertaining when I don't want to punch him; I totally dig the accent," I grinned.

"He spends a lot of time in Europe, so being British gets him further than being an American there."

I didn't have a reply to that, so I moved on to my dessert. Natasha had found me a scotcheroo with a ton of chocolate frosting. I took a big bite and moaned in pleasure. Nat's eyes widened and a grin spread across her face.

"I'm going to get Tony something while you bliss out with your dessert."

"Don't knock it 'til you try it. These things rock - I could eat a whole pan by myself." I happily devoured my bar and polished off my orange juice and water. I licked the chocolate off my fingers and waited for Natasha to come back with a to-go box. I dumped my tray on our way out.

"I'm ready for a long, hot shower," I said as we walked to the elevator. I felt a lot better now that I'd eaten. "And a change of clothes. I'm still dressed like a cheap hooker." I was still wearing the cropped halter top and short skirt from my mission earlier and my flats I'd put on in the jet.

"Fury is waiting for your briefing in his office. I'll drop this off to Tony and bring clothes up to the locker room for you. Your bag is already there; I put it there after you took off earlier."

"Sorry. I just lost my head for a bit there."

"It's okay. I would've done the same if it'd been Clint."

"So you're really okay with what we did on the mission? Like for real?" I leaned back against the elevator wall, tired now that I was full. It'd been a long day and I wanted to be sure that Natasha was giving me a straight answer.

Natasha met my eyes, understanding what I was really asking."Yes, Sarah. What you do on missions is like what an actor has to do for a movie. I just like to pretend I'm someone famous, like Scarlett Johansson, making a crazy movie. You do what you have to do, and then you move on."

"Who would be a good one for me? Nina Dobrev or Emma Watson?"

"Nah. Vanessa Hudgens." Natasha got out of the elevator and turned back to me. "Much more girl next door."

"Ooh. I like her and she's got long hair like mine. Avengers floor," I told the elevator.

_Confirmed_.

I got off the elevator and trudged to Fury's office, ready to get my verbal report done with. I knocked on Fury's door as I walked in. He looked up at me, a small smile on his face as he took in my outfit.

"Have a seat before you fall over on me, Evans. Agent Hill is on her way, so be ready to give your mission report when she gets here."

"That's why I'm here, sir. Sorry about the get-up; I haven't taken time to change yet." I sat in the chair in front of Nick's desk, crossing my legs before arranging my skirt so everything was covered. Maria came in then and took the other chair next to me, tablet ready for voice capture dictation.

"It's fine, Evans. You pull it off more believably than I thought you would. Agent Barton said they bought your act hook, line and sinker."

"They did. We got there Wednesday as planned, wanting to be there before the buyers showed up for the negotiations. Weather delayed some of them, so we played a waiting game until Saturday when the tropical storm passed enough for the rest of them to come in."

"Who were the major players?" asked Maria, listening intently.

"We had several of the Ten Rings regional leaders there. Only one was from South America, code-name Cesar. He wasn't a buyer this time; just the host for the meeting. His stepbrother, code-named Vidente, ran the compound for Cesar." I shook my head. "It was far better ran than any other Ten Rings base I've seen so far; his men were well trained, very disciplined and heavily armed. The whole base was bugged and there were lots of cameras. We swept our rooms on arrival and got rid of most of them, just leaving enough so they didn't feel the need to add in new ones."

"Run me through your take on the rest of the players." Fury said, leaning back in his chair.

"There was Khan, from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Early twenties. My impression was that he's the spoiled son of a rich man. He's used to taking what he wants without regard to consequences, not expecting to be challenged. He's ruthless, cold, calculating. He was the most junior of the Middle Easterners, and it chafed his ass something fierce. There was no real reason for him to be there with Shah and Sahib there, and he didn't bring a woman, so I didn't have an angle to work on him. To quote Hunter, 'I'd trust an adder before I'd trust him.' He makes my skin crawl." I shuddered, thinking of how he watched me.

"Heard he tried to give you some trouble." Maria met my eyes and smiled humorlessly. "Agent Barton said he decided you should be his."

I nodded, grimacing. "Ugg - correct. He didn't believe whatever he'd heard about Ronin's reputation because Clint had to make his point quite literally with his blades when he put his hands on me. Thank God the team reacted quickly the first time so I didn't break my cover as a helpless arm trophy. Maria, I don't know how you or Nat do this on a regular basis without killing the idiots of the world."

"I don't have to anymore since you're here to do the dirty work." She smirked at me and I laughed. Fury snorted and gestured for me to go on.

"After that he watched me close; he also attempted to kidnap me right before we left the base, but I kind of broke cover to neutralize him. His guy took Tripp hostage, so I threw one of Clint's knives and took him out. He was the only one that might've realized I wasn't what I seemed at the end there. My knife throw was a little too good and I _might_ have punched him a little hard. If Khan lived, I wouldn't count on him being around - he pissed off his superior pretty good with that stunt."

Fury nodded at my assessment. "Tell me about Shah and Sahib."

"Shah was the next Ring man; he ranked above Khan. He was the oldest one there, graying at the temples, maybe late forties or early fifties. He and his young wife, Amina live in Kabul, Afghanistan. He's been a Taliban supporter, black market arms dealer, and now Ring region leader. He belongs to whoever's going to pay him the most, although I wouldn't trust him at my back even if he _was_ on my payroll. He's used to having power - not someone to cross lightly on his home turf. Amina is used to ruling his household with a firm hand; she likes the status her husband's power and position gives her. She's aware of his less than legal activities, but not involved in them herself. They have two children, quite young, one boy, one girl."

"Is he loyal to the Rings or is this just his latest position of power?"

"Unsure on that, sir," I shrugged again. "It makes him money and he doesn't really have to change his ways. He reports to Sahib, who was taken into custody in Rio on what sounds like legit drug charges after pissing off Cesar by interfering with his cash flow and maybe sleeping with Cesar's wife."

"I take it there's a new Sahib now?"

"Yes, Talib, the oldest son of the previous Sahib, showed up the day after we did and diplomatically managed to bury the bad blood between him and Cesar. This guy's gonna be one to watch. He's not much older than me, maybe 21 or so, intelligent, _very_ charismatic and used to working for what he wants even though he has deep pockets and access to family resources. He has a bit of a man-crush on Ronin. I'm not quite sure how else to say it; it seemed like he wants Ronin's approval. Not entirely sure on the story there, but Talib knew Clint when he was a youth and remembered meeting him."

"Clint specifically or Ronin?" Maria asked, acknowledging the difference.

"Clint as Ronin," I shrugged. "Clint's Ronin comes off as a bit of a diamond in the rough – capable, trustworthy, confident, with a 'don't mess with me attitude' - which would _definitely_ appeal to an impressionable boy when contrasted to the questionable role model the previous Sahib seemed to be. My take is that Daddy didn't want Talib as competition, so he's built his own following and worked under Daddy when it suited him. Talib lives outside of Tehran, Iran and has one wife, Malika, currently expecting. He loves her like crazy; touch her and he's going to rain hell down on you."

Nick raised his eyebrows. "Almost sounds like you respect him."

I considered that, then nodded, "I do. If I thought he'd go for it, he'd be an excellent Agent. So far he's spent more time taking care of what he considers 'his people' - i.e. getting rid of outlaws and would be terrorists in his own backyard - than being a terrorist himself. He's more like a vigilante police force that the heads of state condone. His role in the Rings is very new, he could be an asset for us with the right incentive."

"Any of our special cargo go home with him?" Fury asked, steepling his fingers.

"No, he didn't want the crates anywhere near his pregnant wife. He sent it all off with Shah and Khan with some of his own men going with them to keep and eye on it. I put a tracker on Malika; I couldn't get close enough to Talib to get one on him."

"Good. The woman took to you, then?"

"Yes. We exchanged numbers and emails and I intend to keep in contact with her. She has some sway over her husband and has mostly encouraged him to stay on the right side of the law for now."

"Who will Sahib take orders from now that he has the position?" Maria asked.

"I don't know yet. They didn't spend a lot of time at Daddy's and Malika is too young to know much about her father-in-laws shady contacts."

"What did you think about the negotiations?" Fury probed.

"I wasn't sure what to expect given the mix present. The Rings had the deeper pockets, meeting our asking price. The mercs all dropped out of bidding after half a billion. I flagged all of the accounts funds were transferred out of so Skye can follow the money back to the source, but it will probably come up as another dead end."

"Are you certain that they won't be able to use anything that we sold them to build more bombs?"

"Other than melting it down for the base metals, absolutely. Reaching cruising altitude will set off the failsafe Tony added to them, rendering the components unusable by the time they land. Talib's men looked in the crates, so they know they _were_ occupied when they loaded them on their planes. The boxes will be empty by the time they go to use them, Fitz's disintegrators will kick in after 96 hours of the failsafe being triggered or 7 days if the failsafe doesn't trip. They're too big for Special Agent Renner to move with her abilities."

"Long enough for them to store them wherever they are planning on putting them but without directly implicating Clint and Hunter." Maria nodded approvingly.

"Exactly," I grinned. "Especially with Shah and Khan in possession of them. The Federales were closing in when we were taking off. Did they clean house?"

"Yes and no. Cesar, Vidente and his woman all made it out; they had someone on the inside that tipped them off so they could make a clean getaway, but that leak is being plugged. Strike 1 and 2 reported that they cleared the compound without a single shot thanks to the sonic charges that you activated on your way out. The Bogota outpost also thanks you for your gifts of intel."

"Good. I'm glad they worked like we hoped. If you're done with me, sir, I'd like to get cleaned up and get back down to Steve," I said as I stood up, watching as Maria closed out of the dictation program.

He nodded. "Evans?"

"Yes, sir?"

"You did well this week. Agents Morse, Hunter, and Barton were quite impressed with how well you handled yourself and the situation, even though you were well out of your comfort zone going in."

"Thank you, sir. I had a good partner for this mission."

"Good to hear - now go take care of Rogers. He's your priority until he leaves Dr Blake's care."

"I'll do everything I can, sir."

I slowly walked to the locker room. It was almost midnight and the floor was deserted. I pushed the locker room door open and began to strip, piling everything on the bench. I grabbed my toiletry bag out of my locker, a washcloth from the pile on the shelf, and turned on the shower.

"I'm not allowed to be alone yet, am I?" I asked Natasha bluntly when I saw her waiting for me when I got out of the shower.

"Nope," she said with a smirk. "Someone gave too much blood today after being shot a couple weeks ago."

"That was like a month ago now," I grumbled as I pulled on my clothes. "I healed up just fine - can't even hardly see the scar unless you know where to look."

"So I see. It blends in with the other faint scars on your back."

I shoved my dirty clothes in my bag and leaned it up against my locker. I grabbed my keys, wallet and phone and tucked them in a side pocket. Natasha grabbed the bag before I could and swung it over her shoulder.

"Ready? I'm assuming you're staying the night with Steve."

"Wild horses couldn't drag me away."

We headed back to the ICU and I was relieved to see that he was looking a lot better. Tony was finishing eating and Clint was sitting in a chair by Bruce. Natasha pulled up another chair and I sat down on Steve's good side.

"Did they take him to do an MRI already?" I gently brushed my fingers across the side of his face.

"Yup," Tony said. "We're just waiting on the results from Dr Blake. He wanted to compare them to his earlier one while we were talking to Fury." Tony closed the take out box and got up to throw it away.

"What did he say?"

"Just wanted to know how Steve was doing," said Bruce. "These are the worst injuries he's had since rejoining Shield."

"His numbers are a lot better than before," I pointed out.

"Yes, and that makes me think that he just needs his rest right now. If you're going to stay, we'll all go get some sleep after Dr Blake comes in." Bruce looked over at me and smiled.

"I'm staying. I think he'd worry if I wasn't here when he woke up since he know he was supposed to see me today."

Dr Blake came in just then. "Captain Rogers' broken arm is healing well - his splint can come off in the morning. He still has a significant amount of internal trauma, but he's improved greatly since he came in this afternoon. We had to realign his femur so the break would heal right and had put a different splint on it, but it's already healing well."

"That's great," Tony said, his face relaxing.

The mood in the room was significantly lighter following the good news, but I still felt like I was barely holding it together. He wasn't out of the woods yet and I knew what the doctor had avoided saying in his report to us. My suspicions were confirmed when Bruce avoided meeting my eyes and patted me on the back on his way out. He looked exhausted and was going to sleep in the cot in his lab in case Steve needed him overnight.

Tony left next, kissing my forehead, his jaw tight with repressed emotion. "Night, kitten."

Natasha came over to me next, and I pulled her into a hug that she surprisingly accepted. She leaned over to kiss Steve on his forehead and I heard her murmuring to him as Clint pulled me into a tight hug. Tears were prickling at the corners of my eyes and I had a hard time swallowing the lump in my throat.

"You did so good, 'Ria. I couldn't have done it without you," Clint murmured. I breathed in his familiar scent as he ran his hands up and down my back soothingly until my muscles relaxed. He kissed my forehead, released me, and turned to go. "Take care of him. We'll be back in the morning, but call if you need us." He put his arm around Natasha and they headed to the door.

"I will. See you tomorrow."

I waited until they all left before plugging in my phone and setting it on the chair next to the bed. I found a blanket in one of the cupboards and turned down the lights. There was just enough room for me to lay next to Steve on his right side. I curled up next to him and pulled the blanket over me. I laid my head on his shoulder and took his hand in mine, twining my fingers with his, too wound up to sleep.

I chattered at him for a while, tears running down my face as I told him how much I'd missed him and how scared I'd been when I found out he was hurt. I talked and talked, pouring out my heart to him until I ran out of words and at some point, I must've fallen asleep because I woke up when the nurse came in to check on him.

"No, honey. You're just fine there. I just need to check his bandages."

I sat up anyway and went to go use the bathroom and wash my face. Natasha had left me a couple bottles of water by my bag, so I grabbed one and took a long drink; I was still a little dehydrated from my trip to Brazil. The nurse was still peeling off bandages when I came back to see what was under them.

"I've never seen anything like this before," she said in disbelief. "I know what they looked like when he got here. I came on early to help wrap him up, so I know I'm not dreaming."

"He heals pretty quick," I agreed.

"I'd say! It's about half the size it was earlier."

"Good. I'm hoping in the morning he'll wake up feeling a lot better."

"Has he woken up yet at all?"

I shook my head. "Not that I know of, but I haven't been here the whole time."

"I'm going to replace his bandage here and then you both can get some sleep."

"Okay," I said as I finished my water and threw the bottle away.

It didn't take the nurse long to tape gauze down and cover him back up again. When she was done, I curled back up and covered up, taking his hand and giving it a light squeeze. He twitched in response, and I smiled as I laid my head back down on his shoulder and fell back asleep.

* *

I woke up to Steve running his hand over my hair. He'd shifted me so my head was laying on his chest and his arm was around me. It was still dark out, and I blinked sleepily up at him before smiling.

"Steve! I'm so glad to see you awake!" I reached my hand up to touch his face and he smiled. He'd taken the oxygen mask off, but he was at 90%, so I didn't comment on it. I hated wearing them too.

"Morning, Sarah. I missed you too."

I leaned up to kiss him, drawing back before it could get too heated. "How are you feeling? You gave me a pretty good scare there."

"Like I got done going a couple rounds with the Hulk. How long was I out for?"

"Since you went down - almost a day? Did you just wake up?"

"Yeah, a little bit ago. I dreamed that you were here and when I opened my eyes, there you were. I couldn't tell if I was still dreaming for a bit, but then I noticed the hospital get up. Can't say I dream about hospitals."

"You were in pretty bad shape, Steve. The doctors didn't think you were gonna make it." I swallowed hard, blinking rapidly and taking a deep breath. "Tony and Bruce can tell you more than I can. I didn't get back until around 1900. Do you remember anything?"

"I remember pushing Nat out of the way and something hit my shield and threw me back pretty hard. That's it. I'm just glad you're here. I missed you so much while you were gone."

"Me too. Other than you almost dying, how did your other missions go? I didn't hear anything before I flew to Brazil."

"They all went well. I guess I was due for some bad luck. How'd Brazil go? Did you get to sit on the beach and drink cocktails?"

"Not quite. It was different from the other kinds of missions I've done. I'll tell you about it later, when we go home. You still need your sleep and it's pretty early."

"You still look pretty tired yourself. How much blood did you give me?"

"At least a pint, maybe more," I hedged.

"I'm guessing it was more if you're this tired. Are you sleeping _on top_ of the covers?"

I giggled, remembering when I'd said that same sentence to him. "Yup. I didn't want to hurt you; I just needed to be near you."

"I'm glad you're right here instead of sleeping in a chair somewhere. It's not like I could drag you back to bed right now without waking you up."

"Oh, Steve!" I leaned up and gave him another kiss. "How about you go back to sleep and I will too?"

"Deal," he said, his eyes closing.

It wasn't a good sign that he was already exhausted from our brief conversation. His oxygen levels had dropped again, so I put the mask back on him; he didn't even fight me. I saw Dr Blake standing outside the room, so I eased myself out of Steve's arms to go speak to him.

"He woke up finally, Doctor."

"So I see; he's improved drastically in the past 18 hours. I hope that you understand, Agent Evans, that medically speaking, there's no way Captain Rogers should 've survived the attack, let alone the trip here. I have no logical explanation for how he held on until you got back." He looked at me with a tired smile.

"I don't need an explanation, Doctor," I said quietly, returning his smile. "Steve's stubborn when he wants to be - and I had faith that he'd pull through."

"I've learned in the years I've practiced medicine that sometimes faith isn't enough."

"I respectfully disagree. Faith is trusting God even when you don't understand His plan, Doctor. And I do trust Him."

"I've never presumed to know God's plans for any of us. I do, however, believe that Captain Rogers loves you very much for him to fight so hard to stay with you. He didn't start improving until you arrived."

His words made my heart ache, and my voice was a little thick when I finally spoke. "I have no intention of letting him go where I can't follow, Doctor. Not if there's anything I can do about it."

"Get some sleep, Agent. I'll see you in a couple hours."

"You too, Dr Blake. You look like you could use a solid 40 winks yourself."

"I could - and I think I will since he's doing better."

"Thank you for everything, by the way. I don't think I told you that earlier."

He patted my shoulder and turned to go to the next ICU room. I woke up a while later to daylight coming in through the window. I looked around to see Natasha and Maria talking quietly in the doorway. I gestured for them to come in and sat up carefully, trying not to jar Steve as they took the chairs by the bed.

"Has he woken up at all, Sarah?" Natasha asked quietly.

"Yeah, around 4. We talked for a little bit and I convinced him to go back to sleep. What time is it?"

"7. We thought we'd stop in on our way upstairs," Maria smiled, more relaxed now that she knew Steve was going to be okay. As much as I knew she'd deny it, I thought she had a little crush on Steve. I knew he respected her opinion and saw her as a member of his team, but I don't think he'd ever realized how beautiful she is.

"What's the plan for the day?" I asked, yawning.

"Nothing special. You're staying with Steve until he gets released. Pretty sure you've earned at least the next week off after your success in Brazil. Natasha and I were just talking about how your fellow agents were all quite impressed with you - Bobbi said she'd work again with you any time."

I flushed lightly. "Thanks; I liked Bobbi. I'm just glad it went according to plan for once."

I felt Steve stir next to me and looked over at him. He blinked up at me and smiled tiredly. I took his hand in mine, tipped my head to indicate we had company and watched him focus on the two women and smile at them.

"Morning Nat, Maria. Good to see you," Steve said, his voice a little raspy yet.

"You had us a little worried for a while there, Steve," said Maria.

"It's good to see you awake, Steve," said Natasha. "I didn't give you permission to die, you know."

I wondered what the story was behind that statement and made a note to ask Clint or Maria about it later. It sounded interesting, to say the least.

"Trust me, dying was never my intention. I apologize for any distress I may have caused you all," Steve said, squeezing my hand gently. Natasha laughed as Steve's grin turned slightly sheepish, a light blush painting his cheeks.

"Rogers, are you apologizing for almost dying?" Maria asked, slightly incredulous.

My phone buzzed. "Bruce is on his way up, Steve." I looked over to see that he'd taken his oxygen mask off again. I shook my head at him. "He's gonna yell at you for not wearing that."

"I hate those things, Sarah. Nat, what happened after I went down?"

"Tony put you on the jet and Jarvis flew while I tried to keep some of your blood _in_ your body. Turns out you kind of need it."

"Ha ha," Steve said sarcastically.

"And we _might_ have set a new speed record for the Quinjet," she finished, looking at him seriously.

Steve winced. "Thank you, Natasha. What about the mission?"

"You're welcome. I think we're even considering you saved me from being a smear on the wall. I get hit like you did, I'm staying down."

"You think so? I thought you regenerated as fast as I do?"

"Not quite. I heal faster than Sarah, but not as fast as you. I can't take the kind of hits that I've seen you take and still be upright."

Bruce walked in then and handed me a cup of coffee before going to look at Steve's monitors. I breathed in the smell and took a sip, careful to not burn my mouth. "Thanks, Bruce. I needed this. I wonder how much of that is just sheer stubbornness, Nat?" I said, considering what she was saying. "He can do amazing things when he really wants to."

"Are you saying I'm more stubborn than Nat?" Steve asked incredulously.

"Yup. I know you are. Some days you can even out-stubborn me."

"Wow - that's saying something," Natasha laughed.

"I just work around you. It helps that you're a feather." His smirk was teasing, but I didn't mind.

"Not a freaking feather," I grumbled out of habit as Natasha and Maria laughed. I took another drink of coffee before climbing off the bed and going over to Bruce. I glanced at the tablet screen over his shoulder, not very reassured by the numbers he was entering on his spreadsheet. "What do you think, Bruce?"

"I don't know yet. He seems much improved, but he reached a stasis point at around 6 am. I'm going to need a couple more tests to see what's going on - along with new scans."

"Is he still hemorrhaging?"

"Yes, I think he has to be, but not nearly as badly as before. I can't believe he looks as good as he does right now."

"Can I give him more blood?"

"No, not unless you absolutely have to," his response fast and fervent. He put a hand on my shoulder and met my eyes. "If you give him any more, you'll need a transfusion yourself, do you understand me?"

I blinked at him in surprise. I must look worse than I felt. "Yes, I understand. So you're going to be taking him for tests?"

"Yes. You might as well go get something to eat. It'll take at least an hour...and I think he'd prefer you to not see him while I'm testing him."

I turned and walked back over to Steve, who was still talking to Nat and Maria. "Steve, if you think you'll be fine for a bit, I'm going to go get some breakfast and maybe stop at home and get some clean clothes."

He took my hand in his and smiled. "You can go get changed if you want, Sarah. I'm sure I get to spend the next hour being poked, prodded and tested."

"Pretty much. I'll see you in an hour then. Be good for Bruce."

"I'm always good." He pulled me in for a quick kiss and I slid off the bed and grabbed my stuff. Natasha had my duffel bag already, so I waved to Maria and we headed down.

"I really think I'll be fine to drive myself home, Nat. I feel fine."

"Probably, but I'm still supposed to keep an eye on you. I'll even start your laundry while you're in the shower," she bargained.

"Fine," I agreed, knowing I wasn't going to win. "You drive a hard bargain."

"Damn straight. I might even let you drive back if you're good."

"What do you drive?" I asked curiously. Natasha never had the same car for very long.

"Wait til you see it."


	34. I'll Come With You

Sarah's POV

We stopped at the beautiful black Corvette Stingray I almost always saw parked next to Steve's spot and my jaw dropped. "I think I'm in love. I want one." She laughed and threw my bag in her trunk as I got in the car. I laid my head back against the soft leather and breathed in the new car smell. "Who do I have to kill to get one of these?"

Natasha laughed delightedly. "This one was a gift from one of my admirers."

"Sounds interesting. Tell me more," I commanded, leaning into the supple leather.

"Not a lot more to say other than he was most appreciative of me keeping him alive for the past several months."

I snorted. "I should have known – my dad is still trying to get in your pants, isn't he?" Her laugh was all the confirmation I needed. "He does know he doesn't have a prayer, right?"

"Yes – Pepper and I are actually quite good friends. Do you know how I first met Tony?"

"Nope, do I want to? It's still a little weird that he's my dad, you know."

The drive passed quickly as she told me the story and I found myself relaxing. We parked in front of my building and she grabbed my bag before we headed upstairs.

I showered, packed a backpack for the next couple days and ate breakfast as we chattered amicably. Over the past two months, we had become good friends, which I think was as surprising to her as it was to me. Natasha Romanoff wasn't an easy person to like and tended to shy away from unnecessary physical contact from everyone - including Clint - a large majority of the time.

When I noticed that, I'd specifically worked on getting her – and the rest of the team - used to being touched by me and even hugged. In their line of work, sometimes the only human contact they had was when they were fighting an enemy. Surprisingly, they all allowed the intimacy - sometimes even without me having to initiate contact.

When we got back to Shield, the rest of the team were already there. I gave Tony a hug from behind, squeezing him firmly. "Morning, Papi."

He shifted so he could hug me back and kissed my cheek, his goatee tickling my face. "Morning, kitten. Did you sleep well? You still look pretty tired."

"I'll take a nap later. How's Pepper?"

"She's coming by in a little while. You can ask her then." I raised my eyebrows at him, but he smiled enigmatically and shook his head.

I walked over to Bruce, who was standing by the window looking out at the Potomac. I put my arm around him and he pulled me tight, burying his face in my hair. He did that sometimes when he was trying to stay calm - he said the combination of scents from my shampoo and my body spray were comforting - and the other guy liked them. I rubbed my hands up and down his back until he let me go.

"He's improved a lot since yesterday," he said quietly.

"You didn't think he was going to make it through the night," I stated.

"I hoped he would, but he's not out of danger yet, Sarah. There's some shrapnel that needs to be removed before he heals much more. It shifted overnight and is now working its way to his heart. We think it's why his internal bleeding couldn't be stopped earlier."

He handed me a tablet with Steve's latest scans on it. I enlarged the images so I could scrutinize them. He pointed at the problem, and my heart sank - I knew this wasn't going to be an easy fix.

"What are you trying to tell me, Bruce?"

"He needs to go to surgery again, but he's awake and we already know that normal anesthesia doesn't work on him since he metabolizes it too quickly. I hate to ask this of you-"

"I'll scrub in and help keep him still," I said quickly, knowing that's what he needed of me. "It's the least I can do for him."

"Thank you, Sarah," he said with obvious relief. "He said he wouldn't go until you were here, just in case something went wrong."

"You should have called, Bruce," I chided him gently. "We could've come back sooner."

Bruce shook his head. "He wouldn't let us. Besides, the surgeon is still on his way in. This requires a specialist."

"I see. Should I be concerned?"

"No. He's the top cardiothoraxic surgeon in the US. Fury called in a favor to get him to come in. We can't bring Steve to him, he's still in critical condition and one wrong move will cause the shrapnel to sever his artery." I felt the blood drain from my face; things were even worse than I'd thought if this was the course of action.

"Why didn't we do this _before_ he woke up?" I asked, lowering my voice.

"We couldn't. He'd lost too much blood yesterday to even contemplate this kind of surgery until his internal hemorrhaging stopped."

"He almost bled out before Nat got him here, didn't he?" I stared hard at Bruce, who swallowed before he finally answered. "You couldn't do it without killing him."

"It was pretty touch and go for a while there - frankly I'm not sure how he's still alive for as bad shape as he was in. They got out as much shrapnel as they could yesterday to stabilize him - but I've seen the pictures of his initial injuries. Either he's the most stubborn man alive, or God isn't done with him yet."

"Both, I think," I said, looking over at Steve. "Dr Blake said something similar last night or this morning; I _think_ it was this morning. It's all starting to blend together in my mind."

"He's very lucky to have you, Sarah. Without the transfusion you gave him, I don't think he would've made it. Natasha asked if she could give him her blood, but we've learned in the past that whatever serum the KGB gave her doesn't play nice with Steve's or yours."

I raised an eyebrow. "Good to know."

I handed back the tablet back to Bruce, noticing that everyone else had left the room. I went over to Steve, sitting back down on the bed and laying my head on his shoulder. "So I hear you're being difficult today."

"Not intentionally," he said with a halfhearted grin. "I guess I was more messed up than I thought when they brought me in."

"Bruce said I can scrub in and go in with you, if that's okay with you?"

"Thank you, Sarah. I'd like that." He took my hand in his. "I know it's not going to be fun to watch."

"I sincerely hope this isn't something you have to do a lot. Will you really be awake for the whole thing?"

"Yes, unfortunately. I have a high pain tolerance level."

"Okay then. You've done this before then?"

"In '44. I took a few too many hits and it took them a while to get all of the lead out of me. My suit had slowed the bullets so they didn't go all the way through me."

I looked up at him in horror. "How many bullets, Steve."

"More than ten, less than twenty...I don't quite remember anymore."

"Liar," I scoffed. "Since when does _Captain America_ lie? You have eidetic memory; I know you better than that."

"I didn't lie. Seventeen is more than ten and less than twenty, and it took three hours, maybe longer to find them all." He pressed a hand to his chest and grimaced. "I'll be glad to have it out of me. I can feel some of the shrapnel when I move. Is this what Tony feels?"

"Then don't move." I patted his chest and sat up so I could see his face. "The surgeon's still on his way here. At least your scan showed that most of your bones have fully healed now, so that's good." My smile was a little wobbly, but it held. Steve's cobalt eyes met mine briefly before a spasm of pain passed across his face, his hand tightening on mine.

"I feel a lot better than yesterday," he said as I took his hand and pressed it to my face, closing my eyes so he wouldn't see how close I was to tears.

"I'd hope so! You almost died yesterday, Steve." My heart hurt just thinking about how close he had come.

"But I didn't, thanks to you."  He brushed his fingers over my cheek with a smile. "Bruce explained what condition I was in when he got here. You're the only reason I'm still here."

"You would've done the same."

"In a heartbeat."

"I hope you never need to, though, Steve." I gave him a kiss. "Now you should rest for a bit. I need to go talk to Dr Blake and Bruce." I brushed his hair back and resting my hand on the side of his face. "You need a haircut - it keeps falling in your face."

"I know." He kissed my palm, a days worth of scruff tickling me.

"I'll be back soon," I promised as I tugged my hand free and headed to Dr Blake's office. Bruce and another man were there, the specialist, I assumed as I let myself in. I put my hand on Bruce's arm, waiting for them to finish their conversation.

"He's ready to be prepped whenever, doctors."

"Agent Evans, this is Dr Q. He just came in from New York a little bit ago."

I held out my hand to the middle aged man. "Nice to meet you, Doctor."

"Agent Evans is going to be assisting by keeping Captain Rogers still and calm. You are aware of the Captain's anomalies?"

He nodded. "Yes, I read the file during my flight. I believe that this might be one of the most difficult surgeries I'll have ever performed on an non-sedated patient."

"Will you be able to get all of the shrapnel?"

"Yes, provided the Captain cooperates. Will we need to restrain him?"

I picked up Bruce in his chair with ease, making the doctors eyes widen. I set Bruce back down with an apologetic smile. "I think we'll be okay without restraints."

"Ah. Yes, I think we will. Shall we go get ready, Agent Evans?" Dr Q stood up, as did Dr Blake.

"Yes. Bruce, will you have someone tell Steve I'm going down to get ready?" I patted him on his shoulder and he looked up at me.

"Of course. I'll tell him myself and come down with him."

"Thanks, Bruce." I turned and went out the door, stepping to the side to allow Dr Blake to lead us. Dr Q walked beside me and I matched my pace to his.

"There is more to you than one would expect, Agent."

"Call me Sarah, Doctor. Thank you for coming in so quickly today."

"It is my pleasure, Sarah. Captain America saved a great many people during The Incident. If not for the Avengers and the Captain, the damage would have been devastating. I understand from Dr Banner that you are close to the Captain?"

"We're dating; he's the best thing that's ever happened to me. I'd do anything for him."

 "And so you have. You have a most difficult job today, Sarah. I'll need you to keep him still and relaxed as much as possible. Without anesthesia, his heart rate will be higher than is recommended for this kind of surgery and there is a risk of further complications. You _are_ aware there is still a possibility that we could lose him on the table?" His gaze was frank as he assessed me.

"I understand, Doctor; I saw his latest scans. All I'm asking is for you to do the best you can for him."

"I will. I'm very good at what I do." He smiled wryly and I rolled my eyes.

"Of course you are - no second raters allowed around here. If you're not careful they'll recruit you as well."

He laughed as we walked into the surgery area. I went into the women's locker room and found a pair of scrubs, bonnet, and booties. I changed quickly, going back out into the hallway. A tech pointed me to the right OR and I saw Dr. Q scrubbing up.

I masked while I waited my turn at the sink. I quickly soaped, scrubbed and rinsed, using lint free towels to dry off. I squirted sterile chlorahexadine rub into my hands and massaged it into my skin until it dried. I followed the doctor into the operating room just as the double doors opened and Steve was being wheeled in by a couple nurses.

"Fancy meeting you here!" I teased him, making him smile. "Steve, we need to put you on the table now. If you want, I can pick you up so they can get the board under you. Otherwise they'll need to roll you since you weigh too much to just slide the sheet over."

"I'd rather you picked me up, Sarah."

"Okay, but no helping; you have to relax, Steve."

A nurse pulled off the covers, leaving him in just his hospital gown. I positioned myself to best take his weight without jolting him,  picking him up and taking the two steps to the operating table after they moved the bed out of my way. I was aware of the number of shocked looks I received; there's no way a 135 pound woman should be able to easily lift a 220 pound man.

I laid him gently on the table, backing away so a tech could cover him with sterile cloths and remove his gown. I pulled on a set of gloves as I stood next to his head, watching them peel off his bandages and start to sterilize his skin as best they could.

"Steve, this is Dr Q," I said. "He'll let you know how to lay when they're done prepping you."

"Hello, Captain Rogers," the doctor said. "It is a pleasure to meet you and be of assistance to you. You saved my wife from harm during The Incident in May."

"Hello Doctor. I'm glad your wife's okay. Thank you for coming in today; I really appreciate it. Just tell me what it is that you want me to do, exactly. They did tell you that I would be awake the entire time?"

"Yes. Dr Banner said he has tried every known anesthetic to no avail. You metabolize them too quickly to make them effective for even a short time. I apologize in advance for everything that we will have to do."

"Yeah, sorry. I'm immune to poisons and toxins as well, but that part has come in handy more than once. Do what you have to do, Doc. I won't hold it against you," Steve said with a small smile.

The staff indicated that they were ready, so the doctor looked over the trays they had ready for him and asked for a couple more tools and for an x-ray. A tech gave me a lead lined covering and I held it up as they cleared the area for the x-rays. They showed up on the screens in the room and Dr Q spent a short time looking at them before gesturing for me to come over.

"These are the two major areas that we'll be working." The doctor pointed at Steve's side and chest. "I will do this lesser one first on his side so I can gauge the Captain's response. He needs to remain still but not tense, and bring his arms up over his head."

"Okay. I'll do my best, Doctor. Don't hesitate to tell either of us what you need us to do."

"I will. Sarah, will you stand at his head for now?"

I nodded and walked back over to Steve. "We're almost ready. Can you give me your hands, Steve? The doctor would like you to have them over your head for now."

"Okay." He slowly brought his arms up and I gripped his wrists, holding them firmly. "Can I speak?"

I nodded. "For now. I don't think you have to wear the oxygen mask yet, but if your saturation levels drop, I'm making you wear it, just so you know."

"All right, Captain." Dr Q said. "If you can keep your muscles relaxed, it would be for the best."

Steve nodded and looked back up at me. "I have to say this is definitely an improvement on the last time I had surgery like this. The assistant today is pretty cute."

"If you wanted to play 'Doctor' you should've just said so, Steve." I said teasingly.

"What is 'Doctor'? Is it a game?"

"I'll explain it later," I told him with a grin he couldn't see through my mask. "It's another one of those pop culture things you missed out on."

"There's a lot of those, you know." He grimaced and squeezed my hands. "I think Dr Q found my broken ribs."

"Breath, Steve," I ordered him. He relaxed his muscles gradually. "So how much you want to bet that Clint and Natasha have bets going on this?"

He breathed slowly for a moment before answering. "I'm not taking that bet, Sarah; I know they do. Nat's ahead right now, I think."

"So do they bet money, or is it just a status thing? They sure do seem like they bet a lot. Breath, Steve. Nice even breaths for me. I need you to not tense up. Concentrate on me and my voice; focus on just me." Sweat beaded on his forehead as he fought the pain and I wiped it away. "You can do this for me, Steve. Breathe in, breathe out, nice and easy."

He did as I asked and that was the start of a long hour of surgery. I chattered at him, keeping him from focusing on the pain. Dr Q retrieved a fair amount of debris, plinking it in the metal pan as he found it. When he finally finished, we repositioned Steve and took another x-ray to see if he got everything before stitching his side closed.

"Hey, babe. We're halfway done; Dr Q is prepping for the next part." I cleared my throat, hearing how scratchy my voice was getting. "I need to get a drink and stretch while they get situated. Will you be okay for a couple minutes while I do that?" I stroked his face lightly with my gloved hand.

"Yeah. Hurry back," he said, giving me a tired smile.

I pulled my mask off and kissed him gently. "I will."

I walked back to the locker room to use the bathroom and text Tony and Nat with an update. A tech brought me a bottle of water and I downed it, still a little dehydrated from yesterday. I scrubbed up again and regloved, ready for the next part. Dr Q prepared me for my role, and I hoped that Steve would pass out because unfortunately, the minimally invasive approach _wasn't_ going to work; it was going to be the harder way.

 "All right, Steve. I'm back. I need to put this cannula in for you because your oxygen levels are a little low right now." I fitted the nose piece in for him and smiled as he complained.

"I greatly dislike these things."

"I know. You're doing great so far. I'm so proud of you." I moved my mask so I could kiss his cheek and he put one hand behind my neck as he turned his head to meet my lips, kissing me deeply. "Doc got out quite a bit of stuff already. How're you feeling, Steve?" I stood to his side so he could see me better, holding his hand in mine.

"I've been better, but I'm glad you're here with me," Steve said, running his thumb over my knuckles. "Thank you, Sarah." He twined his fingers with mine.

"I'm just happy they let me in here with you so you didn't have to do this alone, and don't thank me yet. You owe me a date – a nice fancy dinner _and_ dancing - for this one, babe."

"You got it, doll. You know, I don't know how to dance other than that one you showed me." He smiled sadly, and I knew he was remembering a different time.

I squeezed his hand as Dr Q came up to talk to Steve. "How bad is it, Doc?"

"The shrapnel is almost to your heart, Captain." Dr Q said. "I'm going to have to crack your sternum to get at a large deposit of it near your heart. There is also some damage to your blood vessels that I will repair after I get all the shrapnel out."

"It feels like something is slicing me every time I breathe."

"That seems to be the case, Captain, but hopefully not for much longer." Dr Q met Steve's eyes. "You did very well with the first part. I'm afraid this next part will be rather uncomfortable for you and I'm going to have to ask you to not speak unless absolutely necessary. I will try to work quickly, but we will be working on you for a while yet."

"I'm ready, Doctor," Steve said quietly. "Do what you have to do."

What followed was a long, gruesome surgery that I hoped I never had to be a part of again. I watched as they cracked open Steve's sternum, a tool holding his bones out of the way so they could get to his heart. He laid there, eyes on me as I chattered nonsense to him to distract him, keeping him breathing evenly and steadily.

I couldn't begin to imagine the excruciating pain he was in and I kept one arm on both of his, feeling the tense muscles beneath my hands when they cut him open. He didn't fight me, which amazed me, but he fought to stay conscious, even though I told him it was okay for him to sleep. They pulled out an amazing amount of shrapnel from his chest cavity and from his major arteries.

Every now and again Dr Q would glance up at us to see how Steve was handling it. "Steve, Dr Q wants to know if he should continue. Blink once for yes, twice for no." He blinked once, holding my gaze with pain-filled eyes. I nodded and looked up at the doctor. "He says to continue, Dr Q."

"We're almost done now. Captain, you are going to feel some pressure on your heart itself. It's nothing to be alarmed about, but it will be uncomfortable."

The doctor looked pointedly at the screen, and then back at me, and I understood that I needed to get him to relax, and more importantly, get his mind off of what was going on right now to try and lower his heart rate, which was raising rapidly.

Steve blinked once again and I nodded. "He understands - go ahead." I looked back down at him again, seeing his eyes close as they continued working. "Eyes on me, Steve." He smiled at my stern voice, looking back up at me. "You need to keep your breathing steady now for me. Can you do that for me?"

He blinked once, meeting my eyes. "I know that this probably really isn't the best time to tell you this, but I just wanted to tell you that...I love you."

His eyes widened and I smiled at him as I felt the tenseness leave his muscles; I'd shocked him with my admission. We'd really only been together for a little under two months, but I was sure of my feelings for him.

"I've actually loved you since that first night we talked, after I met the team." I put one hand on the side of his face, stroking his cheek. "I know you can't say anything right now, and I'm certainly not expecting you to say it back to me if that isn't how you really feel. Maybe I'm just a crazy teenager." He blinked twice, smiling slightly at me.

"I'm crazy?" He blinked twice again. "Do you want to know what I love about you?" Steve blinked once. "There's just so much about you that I love," I said slowly, taking my time to keep his focus off of the procedure. "I love how loyal you are to your friends and the team. How determined you are to do the right thing, even if the right thing isn't the easy thing. I love your kindness. I have watched you try to put Chloe at ease when she was terrified by our friends and crushing hard on my other dad."

Steve's lips twitched and I knew he was thinking back to the 4th of July and his birthday party. "I love to watch you draw – you get so absorbed in what you're doing that you lose track of time. I'm so happy that you finally started doing that again because you're so talented, Steve. Anyone could see how much you enjoy doing it."

I glanced up to read the monitors and see how they were progressing. His heart rate was a little higher than the doctor wanted it at, but it was steady. His oxygen levels were holding and everything else looked promising. I turned my attention back to Steve just before they gripped his heart with tongs. I put pressure on his arms to keep him from moving and smiled down at him, lowering my voice so he would have to focus on me.

"Steve, I love how you put up with my weirdness, like my almost always falling asleep when we watch a movie, or how I like to go run in the rain, or that I need to be held before I can fall asleep. I love that you share my faith and will go to church with me when we have time. I love to hear you sing. You have a wonderful singing voice, you know. I think I sound like a pigeon next to a nightingale." His eyes crinkled around the edges as he smiled. "I love how you like to run with me and that you don't always let me win."

I had to pause for a moment to get control of my voice again because I was holding back tears. I knew if I let one escape, that would start the waterworks. "I love how my crazy schedule doesn't really bother you, although your schedule is really no better." I grinned at him when he raised a brow at me, quirking his lips. "Yes, I know I'm partly to blame for that since I help schedule things."

"All right, the hard part is done," Dr Q said. "We're just going to take one more scan to make sure we got it all before we put you back together, Captain."

Steve blinked once. "He's ready, Doctor," I said as I looked up and checked the screens again as they cleared the room for the x-ray. The images must have come back fine because after a quick study of the screen, they started the process of closing him up. I turned my attention back to Steve.

"I really must love you to be a part of this craziness, you know." He blinked once, wincing as they put his ribs back in place. I continued to chatter at him, glancing over at the screens and the procedure periodically.

"How are you feeling, Steve?" Dr Q asked when he finally stood back, pulling his gloves off and taking off his mask.

"Sore. Like Thor hit me with that hammer of his. Not as bad as when I first woke up."

"Is the earlier pain you mentioned gone? There was a significant amount of debris in your aorta and vena cava, as well as the thoracic cavity."

"Yeah, it doesn't feel like I have shards of glass in me anymore. Thank you again, Dr Q," Steve said, shaking the doctor's hand.

A bed was wheeled in and I gently picked Steve up again, settling him comfortably on the bed. A nurse covered him up as I peeled off my gloves before they wheeled him out.

"Steve, I'm going to get changed and then I'll be back up," I told him.

I walked back over to speak with Dr Q. "You did very well today, Sarah." He said with a smile. "We wouldn't have been as successful without you to keep the Captain calm and relaxed."

"Thank you, Dr Q. I saw that you got a lot out of him. Do you think you got it all?"

"As much as possible, yes. If I need to, I can go in laprascopically in a few days."

"You probably won't need to. His body will absorb the smaller pieces as he regains his strength," I said with a smile.

Dr Q looked at me with amazement. "So the wire I used to tie his ribs back together with-"

"Will be absorbed as he heals, yes. By tomorrow you won't know that he was wide open on the table today. He had a broken arm and leg yesterday that's healed today."

"Remarkable! Those breaks looked like they were at least months old from the healing visible on his x-rays."

"I'm going to head back up to him after I change. If you need anything, let me know."

"I'll do that. I'll be going up to Dr Blake's office shortly."

*         *

I paused at the doorway to Steve's room, taking a moment to appreciate the scene there. He was leaned mostly upright, smiling at something Natasha or Maria had said. Bruce and Tony had their heads together discussing something. Clint was balancing his chair on the back two legs. Someone put their arms around me, startling me until I caught Jace's distinctive scent. I leaned back into his chest, smiling.

"Hey. I didn't know you were coming down today," I said quietly.

"Just got here. Romanoff called yesterday night and told me I'd better come as soon as possible; Director Gregg cleared it." In the short time Jace had known Natasha, they'd really hit it off, becoming pretty good friends.

"Where were you?"

"Over in Europe, sorry it took so long for me to get here."

I turned into him, wrapping my arms around his waist and burying my head in his broad, familiar chest. I felt him put his arms around me and stroke my back and hair soothingly.

"I'm so glad you're here," I whispered. "I missed you." Tears were rolling down my cheeks, but I didn't care. I'd been on such an emotional roller coaster today, I no longer knew _what_ I was feeling anymore.

"I'm just happy this was a false alarm. It didn't sound good when I talked to Natalia; she wasn't sure he was gonna make it through the night," he said, his voice unsteady.

"He almost didn't. We just finished the last surgery right before you got here." I felt Jace inhale deeply as that sank in. He looked down at me, wiping my tears away with his thumb.

"Are you okay, Sarah?"

"Yeah, I will be - now that I know he's gonna make it. Why don't you head in? I'll be back in a little bit."

He let go of me, meeting my eyes. "Okay, but I'm sending Natalia after you if you aren't back in ten minutes."

"Natalia? She know you call her that?"

"Her idea. Jason Knight doesn't know Natasha Romanoff; he's just a first year cadet. Go now, if you're still going." He leaned down and picked his bag up, ready to walk in the room. I saw Natasha watching us as I turned to walk away.

 


	35. Stay With Me

Steve's POV

"Steven Grant Rogers, what the heck did you do now?"

I looked up as I heard a familiar voice saying my name. I smiled as I saw Jace Barnes walking into the room wearing a crooked grin, my heart skipping a beat as my eyes played tricks on me, making me think it was Bucky for a moment, even though I knew it wasn't.

 "Jace! What are you doing here?"

He set his pack on the floor by Sarah's bag before coming over to me. That crooked grin widened as he sat down on the bed, leaned over, and threw an arm around my neck. I pulled him close with my good arm, closing my eyes and just holding him for a moment.

"A little birdie told me I better get my ass here since you were trying to die without permission," he said quietly in my ear.

"I'd laugh, but it hurts too bad right now." I said, letting him go. I turned to Natasha and glared at her. "Damn it, Nat! Did you tell everyone that?"

 She only laughed in reply as she came over next to us, leaving Clint at the window. "Glad you could make it, Barnes."

 "Me, too. Even happier it's a false alarm." He pulled Natasha into a quick hug, and I was surprised so see that she returned it. "It's good to see you, Natalia." He kissed her cheek and let her go. "I gave Sarah a ten minute head start about three minutes ago."

Natasha raised a brow at him. "Ten bucks says she's back before then."

"You're on," he grinned, turning back to me. "Sarah didn't know I was coming either."

"Oh," I said, confused. "Is that good or bad?" I thought she'd be happy to see Jace...but then I realized the reason he was here in the first place because they'd all thought I was dying.

"Good." He flashed that Bucky grin at me. "She's had a rough couple days and just needs a little time alone."

"Oh."

I understood now. Sarah didn't like to let anyone see her cry and while the surgery had been rough on her, too, she would've understood why Jace was here for her right away. The ten minutes must be an acceptable time frame for her to get herself put back together before he went to go get her.

"So tell me what happened, exactly," said Jace. "I wasn't on a secure line earlier. My field commander told me I had a solo assignment. I packed my gear and reported in to learn that there'd be a jet picking me up in twenty minutes."

I looked at Natasha. "Your field commander isn't cleared to know about this," she said. "We don't want anyone knowing Steve went down other than necessary personnel."

Jace nodded slowly. "Understood. People don't like to hear that Captain America is human."

Natasha filled him in on what happened up until this morning, then Bruce took over, giving him a less technical explanation than I expected. I noticed when Sarah's ten minutes was up, because Jace tapped his watch and Natasha went looking for her.

Sarah's eyes were a little red when she came in, and I held out my hand to her. She climbed up on the bed and curled into me, linking her fingers with mine.

"You okay, doll?" I kissed the top of her head.

"Yeah," she smiled up at me. "Just needed a little time to process everything."

"That's what Jace said. I didn't know Nat could get him here so quick."

"She's _Black Widow_ , Steve," Sarah said that like it meant something. "Who in Shield is going to tell her 'no'? You, Fury and Maria are the only ones that I know of who rank higher than she does, technically, and you know she'll ignore y'all if it doesn't suit her purposes."

"Oh." So it was a clearance level thing, then. Shield sure was a stickler for that kind of stuff. "So he won't get into trouble at Ops?" My tired mind just wasn't processing right now.

"No, he'll have a story for when he goes back," Sarah said with a smile. "It's not uncommon for cadets to get singled out for individual challenges. The others will assume his orders came from Director Gregg."

"You'd know, I guess. Other than Maria and Clint, you're the only other person on the team that actually went to Ops."

"You lucky duck. You only served in WWII and spent 67 years as a Capsicle to be on this team, Steve." She stroked my face, looking up at me.

I smiled at her, closing my eyes for a moment. "You're spending too much time with Tony, doll."

"Maybe." I could hear the smile in her voice. After a little bit, I heard her again. "Steve, you look tired. Do you want us to go?" She moved like she was going to get up and I tightened my arm around her, cracking my eyes open to look at her.

"No, stay with me? Please?"   

"Always," she said quietly.

 

*    *     *

Sarah's POV

Steve drifted off to sleep, worn out from the surgery and healing in general. I shifted, trying to get more comfortable and looked over at my friends. They'd been talking quietly while we'd been in our own little world.

_Is he asleep?_   signed Clint.

I nodded. "Yeah," I said quietly. "He was awake the whole surgery."

"How was it?" asked Bruce. "Did they get everything out? I couldn't watch - the other guy was getting upset."

"Dr Q got a large portion of it. He only made two incisions other than the chest, but there was a lot in there." I shuddered thinking about it. "I hope I never have to see that again, Bruce. They had to crack his chest wide open and hold it there while they literally scooped out handfuls of debris."

"So they couldn't go in lapriscopically?" Tony asked. I knew he'd looked into the procedure because he still had metal shrapnel in his chest his mini arc reactor was keeping at bay.

"No, it was starting to shred his arteries - we didn't have time. He's still running on a blood deficit even with the several pints they ran in during surgery to maintain his blood supply. I wonder if he's going to need more blood from me?"

"You're not giving him any more of your blood right now, Sarah." Tony said quickly. "You've given him enough."

"Time out! What?" Jace hissed, holding his hands in a T and turning to me. "You gave him blood? How much?"

"At least a pint, maybe more," I hedged, not meeting his eyes.

"How much time did they give you?" he asked, knowing I wasn't giving him the whole story.

"Ten minutes," Tony answered for me.

"So a pint and three quarters at least - if not two. I know you can do a pint in less than six minutes." Bruce and Tony raised their eyebrows; I guess I'd never told them that. "You can't give him any more unless you have a transfusion first yourself," he ground out, glaring at me.

"Fine. I won't," I pouted, sticking out my lower lip.

"I'll tell Mami if I hear you did and Tony didn't okay it." Jace crossed his arms over his chest, digging in his heels.

"You wouldn't!" My mom would read me the riot act because I did know better; Jace had my hands tied and he knew it.

"I would. Try me."

I glared at him, fuming. I loved Jace, but sometimes he just annoyed the living daylights out of me.

"Not that this isn't incredibly entertaining," said Clint with a smirk. I stuck my tongue out at him. "But we should probably go so Steve can sleep." He got up and kissed the top of my head, stroking my cheek. "Take a nap, 'Ria. You're a little feisty today."

"I don't know what you're talking about," I said as I nipped at his hand.

He leveled a look at me and tapped me on the nose like a naughty puppy. "I'll see you later. Be good."

"I'm always good. He's the trouble maker," I said, pointing over at Jace.

Tony came over and put a finger under my chin, forcing me to look up at him. "Love you, kitten. See you later."  I put my arm around his waist and hugged him tight. He put his arm around me, squeezing back.

"Love you too, Papi. Thanks for bringing Jace home for us." Natasha told me what she'd done to get him here when she'd found me earlier.

"Any time, kitten." He patted my back. "Get some sleep yourself; you look worn out."

I waved at Bruce, who smiled at me on his way out with Tony.

"Maria said she'll be by later and I have a couple things to get done yet." Natasha said as they drifted to the door. "Text me if you need something before then."   

"Will do," I said as they left.

Jace was the only one left in the room with us now. I looked over at him, seeing him watching Steve and I with an enigmatic expression.

"You done being mad at me?" he finally asked.   

"Yeah," I sighed. "I know you're just looking out for me. Talk to me for a bit?"

"Sure. Want a pop? I'm going to get something to drink."

"Yeah, thanks. There's a machine at the end of the hall to the right."

"Be right back."

I stared at Steve, seeing how peaceful he looked now that he wasn't in pain any more. There was a motion at the corner of my eye and I saw Dr Blake and Dr Q standing there.

"Hi, come in. He finally fell asleep about ten or fifteen minutes ago."

"Good afternoon, Agent Evans," Dr Blake said, looking at Steve's screens. "I'm glad he's getting some sleep. He looks much more at ease now."

"Yes, he is. I can tell he's feeling a lot better; he was in a lot of pain before the surgery."

"Pulse and heart rate look good, sat levels are a little low yet," Dr Q said, looking over at me. "Can you get him to keep his cannula in?"

"I can try." I turned so I could reach the clear oxygen line that he'd pulled off earlier and carefully put it back on him, smiling as he swatted at me in his sleep. I caught his hand and held it before he could hit me. "What's the plan for him?"

"We're playing it by ear," Dr Blake said. "He can have something to eat when he wakes up and he can drink water if he wants, there isn't any reason he can't now that his surgery is over."

Dr Q nodded at this assessment. "We're keeping him on bed rest for today, at least, maybe tomorrow too."

"Will he need another scan today?"

"Yes, probably tonight after shift change," Dr Blake said. "Dr Q is leaving shortly, but I said I'd forward the scans to him for his opinion.

"Thank you for everything, Dr Q." I smiled widely at him. "It means a lot to us that you were willing to do this for him."

"You're very welcome, Sarah. Take care."

*         *       

Jace came in a minute later and handed me a Coke. "Have you seen Kate lately?"

I shook my head. "I think she's on vacation right now. Have you called her?"

She was really on an Op in Europe, but he didn't need to know that. He raised an eyebrow at the lie, but let it go. I forgot he always knew when I wasn't telling him the whole truth, even if it fooled everyone else.

"No. We've texted a bit, but I've been kind of busy lately with school. You, Steve, Natalia and my parents are the only people I talk to outside of school and that's only when I have time."

"Do you like it there?"

"I do. I wasn't sure about it at first, but this is what I was meant to do. All that stuff I learned with you, it all fits now _why_ you pushed me to learn it. It wasn't just because you were learning it, was it?"

"Yes and no. I was learning it, but after looking into things more when I joined Shield, it made sense to start teaching you, too. You've always been good at languages and you're a natural athlete. You can't tell me you didn't mind being ahead of some of your class."

"I don't mind at all. Makes it easier to learn other things. I'm still getting used to the name, though. I think I finally have a decent signature down."

"Jace sounds like it's short for Jason, more like a nickname. Do people call you Jason or Jace?"

"Depends. Close friends, Jace. Everyone else usually sticks with Jason or Cadet Knight."

"Agent Knight sounds good, though. What did your brothers say about it?"

"They have about a thousand Batman nicknames for me since I haven't been home to beat it out of them," he said dryly, giving me my favorite crooked grin.

I laughed quietly. "They miss you. They called me last weekend and wanted to talk to Steve," I grinned, taking a drink of my pop.

"Did you let them? Please tell me you did or they're going to bug me forever to give them his number."

"No, he wasn't home. He's been gone pretty much all of the last month, and I've been gone for about a week, too. I just got back from South America last night."

"How are you doing with that?" He looked at me intently, taking my hand in his. "Do you still have nightmares?"

"I've been taking more naps," I hedged, not wanting to answer him, but linking fingers with him.

"So yes. Sarah, isn't there anyone you can trust to stay with you? What about Sam?"

"I know he would if I asked him, but I haven't asked."

"Why not? What about Clint? It seems like you two are pretty close now."

"I spent the last week with him undercover, so yes, I could ask him the next time Steve has to be gone for a while. Nat would understand."

"Promise me you'll ask either someone to stay with you."

"I will."

"Promise, Sarah." He squeezed my hand. "And you should tell Steve about them if you haven't already."

"I promise. Steve already knows about them. I had one the night he stayed over after I got shot. I wasn't touching him when I fell asleep."

"Are they still as bad?" He ran his thumb over my knuckles, watching my face.

"No, I don't think so. Different things show up now, like today's surgery - yup, totally gonna see _that_ again another night."

"I can't believe he had to be awake for that," Jace said with a shudder.

"Anesthetics don't work on him at all. They barely work on me and that's giving me more than most doctors are willing to."

"I've never been so happy to be normal. Have you ever met the Cavalry?"

"Yes, and don't _ever_ call her that – she hates that nickname! That story is so over-hyped it's grown ridiculous. Would you call Steve Dorito?"

"What?"

"It's apparently a thing now. He has a very triangular build: wide shoulders, narrow hips. Some wit decided his upper body resembled a Dorito."

"God, no! That's so dumb!"

"So is calling Agent May _the Cavalry_."

"Point made," he sighed.

"Besides, you know Nat can give me a run for my money?"

"Yeah?"

"So can May. I usually win, but it isn't a cakewalk." I smiled at him. "So how long are you staying?"

"I don't know. I should probably be back at Ops by Sunday night, though. What is today?"

"I'm not sure at the moment - I kinda lost track a couple days ago."

He let go of my hand to pull his phone out. "It's Sunday _today_. Crap, I'm already too late."

"Missing something important?"

I yawned and leaned my head back on Steve, the stress of the day catching up with me. I handed Jace my pop to set on the rolling table before I fell asleep and spilled it. I was so tired I knew I couldn't fight it any longer.

"Not really. Sunday afternoon during down time is when we try to beat your record on the holo-trainer."

I smiled. "I'm at 124 now - but you can use the one here, Jace. Have Nat take you since you don't have your badge with you."

"Am I in the system here?"

"They're all linked through a remote server. Your profile will work here just as well. This one is a little bigger than the one at Ops, though; it can run the whole team together." I yawned again, closing my eyes.

"Have you done that before?" I felt him drape a blanket over me as I carefully turned into Steve.

"Nope, haven't had time," I yawned.

 

*         *               *

Steve's POV

Jace was still there when I woke up a while later. He'd turned off the lights and pulled the shades, and it looked like he was taking a nap, too. Sarah was curled up into me, fast asleep. I looked down at her, watching her peaceful face as she slept. It never got old, seeing her like this, all curled up in my arms.

I was so lucky to have her in my life. Not many women would have been able to go through my surgery today with me and help me do what I needed to do. I'd focused on her face and voice, pushing the pain to the background. Hearing her tell me that she loved me had been the highlight of my day - even as I felt the doctor holding my heart right before her eyes. I'd wished I could speak to tell her right then how much I loved her, but I think she knew. I was still going to tell her when we had a little time to ourselves. I wasn't going to try waiting for the right time; it might never come.

I gently kissed her forehead, trying not to wake her. I'd heard people talk about their life flashing before their eyes before they died, but I had never put much stock in it. I still didn't, because both times that I thought I'd died, I only saw a future I was never going to live out.

The first time had been of dancing with Peggy on the date I never made. This last time had been of a full life with Sarah. I had seen us laughing and dancing at our wedding surrounded by our friends before it skipped forward to Sarah pregnant with our child, smiling up at me while I laid a hand on her belly. The final part had been of us holding a baby together. I didn't know if it was a boy or a girl; that didn't matter. The only thing that mattered was that it was ours.

That was the future that I wanted for us, and I knew that we hadn't been together that long, but I intended to ask Sarah to be my wife soon. I'd waited a long time for someone like her and I wasn't going to let her slip through my fingers. I looked over at Jace again to see that he was awake now and looking at us with Bucky's crooked grin on his lips.

"Hey, Steve; I didn't think you were awake," Jace said as he sat up, rubbing his hand over his face.

"Just woke up a little bit ago. How long was I sleeping?"

He searched for a clock. "A little over two hours. Sarah's been out for about an hour and I got a little catnap in to help me get over the jet lag."

"I'm glad. She looked exhausted."

He considered something for a long moment before finally deciding to say it. "She doesn't sleep well when you're gone."

I nodded. "I know she gets nightmares sometimes."

He shook his head emphatically, catching my attention. "Not just _some_ times, Steve. Every night if you aren't there to keep them at bay."

"Me specifically or anyone?"

"Trusted male; Chloe said Sarah always has them when she stays over with her."

"So you-"

"Used to stay with her almost every night when she lived at home," he said. "I'd hold her until she fell asleep and then I'd go home. She'd be fine for the rest of the night as long as I held her before she fell asleep."

"If you didn't?"

He met my eyes and I saw the pain he felt for having failed her. "Have you seen her have them?"

"Once. She backed away from me in her sleep, terrified of me until I woke her up. Do you know why she gets them?"

He nodded. "You have to talk to Sam on this one; he was there. Don't ask her - _please_ \- it'll only make them worse for her."

"I will. Thank you for telling me, Jace."

"You need to know. She shouldn't stay alone when you're gone for long periods of time. She can go for days without sleep if she has to - and she _will_ just to keep from having them. Otherwise, she takes crazy high doses of sleeping pills to knock herself out so she won't dream."

Natasha came in just then. "Who are we knocking out?" she cracked her knuckles, looking at me and Jace.

I shook my head. "No one. I know how you like to do it with those electric charges."

"It doesn't work on you, Steve," she scoffed, crossing her arms.

"Doesn't mean it feels great!"

"I suppose not." Natasha had a wicked grin on her lips. "It's not meant to."

Jace chuckled as he stood up and stretched. "Natalia, do you think you could take me to the holo-trainer here? Sunday nights we usually try to break Sarah's record back at Ops, so she suggested I use the one here."

"What's the record?"

"124. I'm getting closer – I got to 97 last week."

"You're in the lead then?"

"Of course! I helped her calibrate the damn thing when we were 14. The holograms used to give you a shock when you missed them, but I convinced her to get rid of that setting."

"I bet you did," I said, looking at him consideringly. "At 14 you probably missed them a fair amount."

He rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "Something like that. She had to restart my heart once when it glitched and I missed a bunch of them."

Natasha laughed as I looked at him in horror. He flashed a grin at me. "I wasn't sure if I hurt because my heart stopped or because she cracked a couple of my ribs restarting it."

"Both. It really hurts when your heart stops beating." I rubbed my hand over my chest lightly as I remembered the last time that had happened to me. "Actually, it's not so much the _stopping_ that hurts as when the beating starts again."

"I didn't break any of your ribs this time, Steve!" Natasha protested.

"I know," I said with a grin. "They were already broken, Nat. A building fell on me or something like that."

"RPG, bomb, building; you got the trifecta this last time. Let's not go for a repeat."

"Wasn't planning on it."

"Come on, Jace. I want to see you in action."

"See you in a bit, Steve." He grinned at me as he snagged his pack from the floor on his way out.

I stroked Sarah's hair while I thought about what Jace had told me. She'd just spent almost a week on her own op, so it was likely that she was still running on a sleep deficit. I always thought it was hard to fully fall asleep in hostile territory. I'd been mostly gone for the two weeks prior to that, only back for a day or two before having to take off again. At least I should be around for her for the next couple weeks. There wasn't anything big coming up, and I was off the duty roster for probably the next week or so after today's surgery.

I woke up a while later to see Natasha and Jace sitting next to each other and whispering quietly. Sarah was still sleeping, but it was a light sleep and I thought she'd wake soon. I watched them talking for a while, since they didn't know I was awake. Jace was quite taken with Natasha; to my surprise, she seemed to like him as well. I watched her flush slightly when he brushed back some of her russet hair that had fallen into her face and smile slightly when she thought he wasn't looking.

Natasha noticed I was awake when Jace's phone rang and he answered, walking quietly out of the room to talk on the phone. She gave me a measuring glance and I smiled slightly.

"I'm not opposed to it, Nat. You like him, don't you?"

She skirted the question. "I sense a hesitation to your statement."

"Concern, not hesitation." I clarified. "He's never seen the real you, only the side you've let him see."

Natasha sat back in her chair and crossed her arms. "You don't think he's ready for someone like me?"

"That's not what I'm saying, not at all," I said, confused at the mental leap she'd made.

"Then what _are_ you saying, Steve?"

"I think he'd be good for you, if you let him get close to you; just remember that he's still very young, Nat." I leveled a look at her and she knew what I was talking about. Sarah and I had minor miscommunications sometimes simply because she was so much younger than me - not just because we came from different times, although that was sometimes part of it.

"And I'm quite jaded. What will Sarah say?"

"He's her best friend," I said slowly, "but I think she'll just want you both to be happy. I take it you and Clint are off again?"

"Yeah, since before he left for Brazil. I do love him, in my own way. It's just not the way he needs to be loved. We're better off as friends for now."

"Like I said, I'm not opposed to it. He'll be good to you."

Natasha smiled softly, reaching out a hand to touch mine. "I know."

I squeezed her hand lightly, searching her face. "It's a nice feeling, being happy. It takes some getting used to, though."

Natasha pulled her hand back as Sarah started to stir. "Is it worth it?"

I didn't try to pretend I didn't know what she was asking. "Yes. You'll see."

"Maybe," she said, and I smiled at her prevarication. I hoped she did get a chance to experience this kind of happiness, because it was like nothing else I'd ever felt.

 

*           *  

I looked down at Sarah, who was blinking her eyes and sitting up. "Did you have a nice nap, doll?"

"Mmmhmm. How are you feeling?" She focused her golden brown eyes on me, searching my face.

"I've been better, but not too bad, all things considered," I said with a smile. "I can't believe how much crud they got out of me this morning."

"Me either." Sarah smiled, satisfied that I really did feel better. She looked around and gave Natasha a puzzled look. "Where's Jace, Nat?"

"Phone." Natasha gestured at the hallway. "He didn't want to wake you up yet. You looked like you needed the sleep."

"I did," Sarah said as she yawned and stretched. "I didn't sleep much last night."

"Who really sleeps well when they're in a hospital? There's always monitors going off or pumps or the nurses coming in to take your vitals or change your dressings," Nat griped. I knew she hated hospitals, but I didn't know that she felt that strongly about it.

"True, I guess."

"Sleeping Beauty finally awake?" Jace asked as he came back in the room.

"Like you can talk! You took a nap, too!" Sarah stuck her tongue out at Jace, and his grin widened.

"Just enough to tide me over for a while and help with the jet lag."

Jace sat back down next to Natasha as he stuck his tongue out at Sarah, making them all laugh. I simply smiled, laughing would hurt too much right now. I caught a motion from the corner of my eye and looked over to the door to see Dr Blake standing there, putting hand sanitizer on before coming into the room.

"Good evening, Captain. You look a lot better."

"I feel a lot better."

"I'm certainly glad to hear that. Since you're awake now, I'd like to get some new scans, see how you're healing. Dr Q left already, but asked if we would forward them on to him."

"Is there anything I need to be concerned about?" I asked, meeting the doctor's eyes. He didn't say anything right away, instead looking over my screens with a thoughtful look on his face. Finally he turned back to me.

"We'll know more after your scans. Until then, I'm afraid it's too soon to answer that question. I still don't know how you survived the amount of damage you sustained, let alone the journey here from your mission."

"I had a very compelling reason to pull through, Doc," I said, squeezing Sarah's hand. She smiled up at me and shook her head slightly.

"You just didn't want Nat to kill you because you tried dying without permission," Sarah said with a grin. Dr Blake looked at Natasha with a raised eyebrow, but she only shrugged, making me grin at her.

"I believe it worked," Natasha said, eyeing me. "You're still with us, even though it was touch and go for a while there."

Dr Blake cleared his throat, bringing us back to order. "You are free to eat and drink if you feel like it, Captain. If you don't that's understandable, but as high as your metabolism is, I must advise you to try to at least eat before you go to sleep tonight. You've already lost what little body fat you had, and I don't want you to lose any more weight."

"I am kind of hungry," I agreed. "Maybe I'll try to eat after my scans. Thank you, doctor."

"Excellent. They'll be in for you soon." Dr Blake said as he turned to walk out.


	36. Little Talks

Sarah's POV

"What do you feel like eating, Steve?" I asked, standing up and stretching. "I'll order as soon as they come get you so it isn't cold by the time you get back."

"Surprise me," he said with a smile.

"Then I will."

We didn't have long to wait before the techs came to get Steve. I called in a food order for him and went to go sit next to Jace and Natasha.

"How you holding up, pooka?" Jace asked, putting his arm around me.

I thought for a moment before answering. "Better than yesterday. I'm glad I didn't see him when they brought him in because after looking at his scans and screens, I was honestly afraid he wouldn't make it."

"I didn't think he was gonna make it," Natasha said after a slight pause. "Not in the condition he was in when we dug him out."

"I'm going to go find Bruce, stretch my legs for a bit. I'll be back in a little while."

"Take your time. We'll wait here for Steve to get back."

I nodded as I headed out the door for Bruce's lab to see if he was still there for the day. He was poking around at his computer, a half eaten meal on a tray near him.

"Hello, Sarah." Bruce said, looking up from his work. "I've been expecting you."

"Am I that predicable, Bruce?" I pulled up a chair and made myself comfortable.

Bruce was smiling slightly when I looked back over at him. "Yes, at least when it comes to certain things."

"Steve being one of them."

"Of course. How's he doing tonight?"

"He slept for a while and they're taking him for more scans. He says he feels a lot better without all that crap in him anymore."

"I would imagine he does. Dr Q was quite amazed by how much he'd improved when he saw the initial assessments and scans to the ones he took while he was doing the surgery."

"I was quite impressed by Dr Q," I said, thinking out loud. "Not many doctors would be willing to do that kind of surgery on someone they can't anesthetize - or even do a nerve block. Steve didn't resist me at all though."

"Of course he didn't." Bruce said, patting my arm lightly. "You kept him distracted and did your best to keep his mind off what was going on around him. Dr Q said it wouldn't have been possible without you."

I could feel my cheeks growing hot under the praise. "Tony could have done it, too. He would have needed his armour, but he could have done it."

Bruce snorted in disbelief. "Steve would have punched him an hour because Tony would've made one too many stupid remarks by then. Too much time alone with Tony tends to do that to a person."

"He doesn't make you turn green," I observed, raising an eyebrow at him. "I thought you two were besties?"

"There are days when I have to walk out of the room, but so far, he hasn't - not for lack of trying." Bruce shook his head and sighed. "I get along with Tony fine _most_ of the time, but we don't always see eye to eye on everything."

"So what didn't you want to tell me, Bruce?" He gave me an innocent expression and I smiled. "That look doesn't work on me, darling. I know you're keeping something from me." A thought occurred to me and alarm crept into my voice. "Is it about Steve? It's bad, isn't it?"

"Whoa, Sarah. Don't get upset, it's nothing like you're thinking." He raised his hands and I crossed my arms, waiting for him to go on. "I've been made aware of the fact that you've given blood to Jace before."

"Yes, when we were 12."

"Do you remember how much you gave him?"

"Of course; it was about six pints - spread out over six months, a little less than a pint at a time." I wrinkled my nose, remembering what an ordeal it had been. "Since I was so young, they wouldn't take a whole pint from me at one time."

"I asked Jace for a sample of his blood today."

"And?"

"I took the liberty of looking into his medical records. Since he's in Ops, I can access them easily."

A lightbulb went off. "Ahh, I know where you're going with this now. Yes, I'm aware of how my blood changed him. That's why I can only give a certain amount, no more than a pint at a time, to select individuals. All of the Avengers are on that list, with the exception of Natasha."

"Does he know? Jace, I mean?"

I smiled widely. "Yes, he does. He had a very rare, supposedly incurable blood cancer when we were kids. That's why I did it in the first place, Bruce. Remind me to tell you how Jace and I first met sometime - it's a good story."

"There's no record of cancer - not even a trace of that - anywhere in his file."

"I've been with Shield since before I was born, Bruce." I leveled a look at him. "They removed any mention of it from all of his files after he received my blood and we knew it was working. Jace didn't know he was also shortlisted into Ops Academy when the treatment was successful; his parents did."

Bruce knew about Jace's name change and the reasons behind it, so I expected his next question. "So you talked him out of joining the Army?"

"Yes. All that stuff about Barnes men is all true, unfortunately, but yes, once I could start my training and taught him what I knew, I convinced him to join Shield. He'll be a great agent."

"I can't say I approve of your manipulation, but I understand why you did it. There's no way I want the US government getting their hands on his bloodwork – or yours, Sarah."

I nodded. "You of all people know how many people would be after me if they knew what I could do." I was aware of how Bruce had become the Hulk, and General Ross was still active in the Army.

"Yes, I do," he said slowly. "Which leads me to my next question. How enhanced is Jace?" He held my eyes as he sat back in his chair, a picture of patience waiting for me to answer him.

I shook my head. "Not very much. Jace is fully human, just slightly enhanced as far as reactions, endurance and musculature. He can't lift what I can, run as fast as I can or heal as fast as I do."

"What would happen if you continued to give him blood periodically?"

"I don't know." I admitted. "We've never needed to find out since we've grown up. Until Steve, I haven't given anyone else blood, and our serums are similar enough that we shouldn't have any issues."

"I can certainly understand why you'd do that for both of them, knowing how much you care about them."

I changed the subject, not wanting to let him evade me. "What else did you need to talk about, Bruce? That wasn't the only thing."

"No it wasn't, but I'm glad that you could answer some of my questions, Sarah."

"Anytime. If you ask Jace nicely, he might even let you run some tests. It's been a couple years since I've run any on him." I held up one hand, anticipating his next question. "Yes, I have the data from them and I will forward it to you when I have time to stop and get it. I have it stored on an external hard drive in a secure location."

"You read my mind," Bruce said with a smile. He took off his glasses and put them on the desk. He tapped at his computer and some scans showed up on the large wall mounted screen. "These are Steve's first scans from when Natasha brought him in."

"All right – they look horrible. Am I looking for something specific?"

"Yes. Look here and here." Bruce highlighted two segments of Steve's spinal cord that were completely split. "Now look at this scan from today and tell me what you think." He positioned them side by side for easier comparison.

"Both sites are almost completely healed. The bone structure looks a little weak yet, but considering that it was reduced to pebbles, it looks good."

"How did he manage to heal from that? There's no possible explanation for reattaching a severed spinal cord of that degree of separation, and yet he did."

"It's the serum, Bruce. I broke my back when I was 6 - freak accident - and healed from it completely. I severed my spinal cord and everything." I went over to the computer and quickly dove into my medical files to find my before and after scans and put them up on the board for Bruce to see. "It took me about a week, but I didn't lose blood like Steve did. Otherwise he would've healed faster than he is right now."

He studied the scans before looking over at me and shaking his head. "I just can't wrap my mind around it. I know that it's possible for the body to heal itself, but we simply realigned everything that was broken and it's healing together without anything other than a splint."

"Can you break bones, Bruce? Or does the Hulk show up to the party?"

"No, the Hulk shows up if my body is pushed to that point. I no longer attempt to do any sort of carpentry. I hit my thumb with a hammer in a remote village and the next thing I knew I was green."

"Good to know; don't ask you to hang up pictures."

I closed out of my scans and brought Steve's back up. I keyed in a couple of commands and breaks and other major injuries were highlighted on both scans. There was a significant difference in the amount of highlighting from the first scan to today's. I keyed in another command and the shrapnel still in Steve lit up in green. I pulled up his mid-surgery scans for comparison.

"There's still quite a bit of junk in him still, but less than before. What do you think, Bruce?"

"If he keeps reabsorbing it at the rate he has been, I think he'll recover completely within the week."

"Tell him two so he doesn't overdo it." I suggested. "That way everything else will have had time to heal or be absorbed."

"Good idea. Think it will work?"

"Yup. If you don't need anything else from me, I'm going to head back up." I hugged him from behind, and he patted my arm lightly.

"Go on with you, kid. I'll be up soon, probably after I talk to Dr Blake. I'll have him tell Steve whatever we decide."

"Even better. Bye Bruce." I let go of the older man and waved as I left the lab.

 

*    *        *

 

End of August 2012  
Steve's POV

"So when are you gonna have sex with Sarah? Because I could cut the sexual tension between you two with a knife," Natasha said suddenly, startling me. I hadn't even known she was there until now.

"What?" I asked as I turned to look at her, not sure I'd heard her correctly.

I was never going to get used to the way Natasha would randomly drop these little bombs on me. I'd been watching Sarah work out in the holo-trainer for a while now, just absorbing the way she moved and flowed with the program. This was even better than watching her dance because the moment she walked into this room, she dropped the masks and was truly herself in a way I never saw her anywhere else. She was beautiful – and deadly.

"You heard me, Rogers. Why haven't you done it with her yet?"

"I heard you, I'm just not having this conversation with you, Romanoff. Just stay out of it." I crossed my arms in front of my chest, slanting an annoyed glance at her.

"You're fully healed and cleared for active duty again, so that's not it," she said in a considering tone.

"Yes, I'm fully healed," I snapped, wishing she'd drop it. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"Nothing, apparently." Natasha gave me a grin, and it wasn't a reassuring one. "Is it because of her age, because 18 is legal, you do know that?"

"I'm not talking about this with you." I turned away from her, attempting to ignore her, but Natasha was having none of that, putting herself in front of me.

"So it _is_ her age; good to know." She gave me a sweeping look. "I told her that's probably part of the reason why you didn't want to have sex, and I was right."

"Drop it," I growled.

"Can't, not until you talk to me."

I made a frustrated noise and glared down at the small redhead. " _WHY_ do you want to talk about this right now?"

"She's coming with me on a mission next week. We're leaving right after the holiday and we're going to be gone for probably a month, maybe two, depending on how things work out."

"Covert?"

 "Of course. You need to have sex with her before then. I can't take her along as a virgin – it's too much of a risk to her. It's bad enough we sent her to South America  in the role she had to play as a virgin. If it wasn't for Bobbi and Clint, she never could've pulled it off convincingly."

"I _really_ don't want to talk about this," I said in a low voice. I didn't want to think about her being with anyone else, not even Clint, who was a really good guy. "That was for a mission, I don't need to know anything about it."

"Too bad. I'm not giving you a choice. If you don't, she'll stick out like a sore thumb...and there's the possibility we might not be able to get her out otherwise."

"Does she know this?"

"Sarah is aware of the risks and is willing to go through with it as she is. She doesn't know I'm talking to you about it."

"Then why _are_ you talking to me about it? What kind of mission are you going on that it would have that kind of requirement in the first place?"

"Because I'd rather bring her home _without_ blowing valuable long term covers. I unfortunately need another partner for this and Bobbi's still unavailable. Believe it or not, Shield doesn't have many other women that have the dancing ability and level of beauty that's necessary for this one, other than maybe Maria, but she doesn't dance and there's no way she can go on this one without blowing both our covers. You know she's not exactly the friendliest person sometimes when people try to touch her."

"I really don't want to know any more about this mission, do I?" I asked rhetorically, rubbing my hand over my face.

"It's probably best that you don't. I'm serious, though. You need to do this for her."

"Go away, Nat." I turned away from her, still not wanting to think about it. She touched my arm, pulling at it so I would face her and stepping in front of me.

"Just promise me you'll think about it. She's already asked me what's wrong with her."

I stared at her in surprise. "There's absolutely _nothing_ wrong with her!"

I loved her; Sarah was more than I'd ever thought that I'd ever want or need in a woman. I knew we hadn't been together for long, but I wanted to do things the right way, not rushing because we got caught up in the moment.

"Then quit pulling back from her. You're not doing her any favors, Rogers; she thinks that you don't want to be with her physically because you're still in love with Peggy."

"That's not true."

"Isn't it?"

"I loved Peggy back then, it's true; that was before I knew Sarah. She's... I don't know how to say this; I've never tried to put it into words, I guess." I blew out a breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding and took a moment to gather my thoughts. Natasha waited patiently for me to continue, eyes on my face, analyzing my expressions.

"Go on."

"I guess I'm trying to say that she's temperamentally more suited to me than Peggy. If you knew Peggy," Natasha nodded once, a slight smile on her lips. "Then you knew how prickly and independent she could be. She hardly allowed me to hold a door for her, let alone do anything else. Honestly, I never felt that I was ever _enough_ for her. I don't even know if she truly returned my regard because we never got the chance find out."

"Then it's a good thing that you have a clean slate. Just think about it, Steve. Times have changed - no one knows that more than you. Sarah isn't Peggy, so don't make the mistake of thinking that they'd both want the same things...or even in the same order."

I nodded, knowing that at times I still merged them in my mind. It wasn't as often anymore, but it still happened more than I liked to admit. Maybe I was guilty of thinking about what Peggy would expect instead of what Sarah really wanted from me.

Natasha studied me for a long moment, then turned to go out the door. I watched her leave, not truly thinking that the conversation was over. She stopped right before the door and pivoted to face me again.

"Will you at least think about it, Steve?"

I hesitantly nodded. "I can't promise any more than that, Natasha."

"Talk to Clint if you don't want to talk to me." With that, she walked out the door.

I turned back to the glass to watch Sarah's training, but Natasha's conversation was replaying in my head. I couldn't stay still right then, I needed to be doing something, anything. I had a feeling that Natasha was right. I couldn't deny that I'd been digging in my heels about doing anything more than we already had, and I knew that she was frustrated.

I kind of wanted to talk to Maria about what this mission was going to entail – I knew she'd at least give me a straight answer. From what little Natasha had told me, though, I wasn't going to be comfortable talking to a woman about it, not even Maria.

There'd been times where I'd needed a female partner who trusted that I'd do whatever the mission required, whether I wanted to do it or not. Usually, it had been Natasha - her leading me more often than not. There was nothing Natasha wouldn't do for a mission, which had led to her kissing me more than once to avoid detection by interested parties. She was a good kisser, but I wasn't interested in her that way.

I decided to track down Clint. I'd thought things through and decided that he was probably the most likely man to talk to. I certainly wasn't going to ask Sam or Jace; they saw Sarah as a little sister.

I found Clint at the firing range, practicing with a variety of guns. I was mildly surprised; I knew he was an excellent marksman, he just preferred to use a bow. I touched his shoulder so he'd know I was there. He turned and took off his ear protection.

"Hey Clint, if you aren't doing anything tonight, did you want to go out for a beer?"

He looked up at me in surprise. "You buying?"

"Sure. Pick you up at 8?"

"Sounds good. See you tonight, Steve."

 


	37. Guy Talk

Steve's POV

Sarah and I pulled up in front of Clint and Natasha's apartment building just as they were coming outside. I leaned over and gave Sarah a quick kiss before she got out of the car. "See you tonight. Have fun."

"Bye. Don't drink Clint under the table."

"No promises. He still thinks it's possible to get me drunk."

Sarah laughed as she got out and walked over to Natasha's SUV. Clint hopped in the passenger seat and shut the door. I pulled back out onto the street and headed for our favorite local bar. The selection was decent and no one really ever bothered us when we were there to unwind. We drove in silence; Clint didn't feel the need to fill the quiet and I liked the music that was playing on the radio.

We got our drinks and found a quiet, out of the way booth to sit and talk.

"So what's on your mind, Steve?" Clint asked, taking a pull of his beer.

"Is it that obvious?"

"You've been out of sorts all day. Everything okay with you and Sarah?"

I nodded and smiled. "Yeah. We're good. I like being with her – she makes me happy. I know that word is completely inadequate but I don't know how else to say it." I ran my hand through my hair in frustration. "It's just that we've been dating for a while now and things are starting to get more...serious." I took a long drink of my beer before I continued. "I kinda feel like she wants to take it to the next step and to be honest, that terrifies me."

Clint studied me for a moment. "Are you concerned just because you're so strong? Are you afraid you're going to hurt her?"

I didn't want to think about hurting her, but I was strong enough that I could easily if I wasn't paying attention. "Something like that. I know it's a possibility," I allowed. Clint waited for me to continue, and I struggled for words, not really comfortable talking about this subject. "It's mostly that we stay together every night we're both in town, and while I've been able to hold back for now, she's quite _determined_ to be more intimate than we have been."

"Hold that thought," Clint said, holding up a hand. "I need a couple more beers if we're having this talk tonight." He drained his bottle and sat it back on the table with a firm click. I signaled for another round and the waitress brought them over quickly, trying to flirt with me. I ignored her and watched as she gave Clint an appreciative once over before going away.

"You didn't even look at her, did you?" Clint asked, smirking at me.

"Who? The waitress?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes the waitress! She was practically throwing herself at you."

I shrugged. "I've got Sarah, and I don't really care for that kind of boldness. It's a turn-off to me."

"How did Sarah catch your attention - Nat said something about falling for you?"

I smiled as I thought about the first time I'd met Sarah; it seemed like such a long time ago now. "She tripped over me in the hallway right after she'd moved in. I'd crouched to pick up my keys and she didn't see me. We talked briefly and then I showed her where the workout room is at our apartment building."

"Seriously? Just like that," he snapped his fingers, "you were interested in her?"

"She tells the story better than I do. I spent the first week doing everything possible to avoid her, if you want the truth." Clint laughed, slapping his hand on the table. I waited until he finally quit laughing to continue. "And then she showed up at Shield that next week - the first day you met her." I took a drink before saying something I'd never said out loud before. "It was then that I realized that since she was with Shield, I could get to know her without having to lie to her."

"Yeah, women really don't like it when you lie to them, even if it's for a good reason - like their own safety," Clint said wryly and I wondered what the story was there. "I saw your reaction to her that day, Steve. You looked like you saw a ghost."

"In a way, I did. Sarah's resemblance to Peggy is uncanny, which really threw me for a loop for a while."

Clint sobered abruptly. "True. She's a dead ringer for Peggy. I take it you don't have the two confused anymore?"

"Yeah. It helps that their personalities are almost complete opposites. Now that I've spent more time with Sarah, I see her instead of just the similarities. At the beginning of our relationship, there were times when the lines got blurred and I wasn't certain who I was with. Sarah would say something Peggy had said to me and...well...I got lost in a memory. It still happens sometimes when I'm least expecting it, but those times are fewer now."

"Did you ever go see a shrink about that? Nat said you wigged out a couple times and scared Sarah pretty good."

"Yeah. I've started to meet with one of her friends, Sam Wilson, who's a psychiatrist at the VA. You met him when he came to Tony's for my birthday party."

"Yeah, I remember him. Seems like a decent guy - he'd have to be for Sarah to be that close of a friend."

I nodded. "He is. He's easy to talk to and Sarah trusts him. After the museum incident a while back, I promised her I'd see someone."

"Do you trust him?"

"I do, now that I've gotten to know him. He's a combat vet, so he understands what I've been going through, both in the war and adjusting to this time since I'm more of a civilian now than a soldier. I think it's been helping, talking to Sam."

"Good. You seem more _adjusted_ now than you did when I first met you, I don't think it's just because of Sam."

"Thanks?" I replied, making Clint grin slightly.

"So how is working with Rumlow and the Strike teams?" he asked, taking another drink. "Every time I turn around you guys are heading out somewhere on a mission lately."

"You're welcome to join us, Clint. You're certainly qualified for most of the kinds of missions we've been doing."

Clint shook his head and smiled. "Nah, I'm good doing my own thing. I've got plenty of my own missions scheduled - and I don't play nice with others, according to Nat."

I shrugged and took another drink, draining my glass. "It's different than working with you guys. With the Avengers, we're a team and we all have different strengths. The Strike teams are all made up of the same kind of guys with most of the same strengths. It's not that I can't work with them; we function a unit fine - I just don't feel like I _belong_ with them."

"You don't think that they've got your back?"

"I don't know. They've proved that they do more than once, but even after working with them, I don't know anything about some of them. I just feel like they're still giving me their cover stories."

"Hmm. Most of that crew makes my hand twitch, but there's nothing that I can put my finger on that would explain it. Nat doesn't trust them, but Nat doesn't trust anyone."

"Some days I'm convinced Nat doesn't trust me either," I said honestly.

Clint shrugged and laughed. "Join the club. What's Sarah say about you doing all these high risk missions with them - especially since the last one landed you in the hospital?"

"Since Sarah does a good part of the prep for our missions, she knows what we're getting into. We've always got an exit strategy...or two... depending on what the mission is and where it's at."

"Good girl. I couldn't tell you how many times I've had to make my own exit strategy when things went south." 

Clint finished his beer and called the waitress over. He ordered some whiskey and told the girl to bring the whole bottle. The girl gave us a look, but came back with two glasses and a bottle of Jack Daniels.

Clint poured us each a full glass and slid it over to me. I drained it, knowing he was still trying to get me drunk; he thought it was just an act. I found it amusing that even knowing how fast I healed from wounds that would've killed a normal person, Clint had yet to be convinced of this.

"At least you never have to guess how Sarah feels about something because she'll tell you if you ask," he said, refilling my glass before taking a sip from his.

"She'll tell you even if you don't ask sometimes, depending on how strongly she feels about something," I pointed out, laughing.

Clint snorted, "That's the truth. So I know Sarah goes out with her own handpicked Strike team at times. What do you think about that?"

"I think Sigma - that's what they decided to call themselves - gets a lot done under the radar. One of us," I indicated myself and Clint, "goes anywhere and people notice; a small response team that isn't immediately recognized is often more effective. They can go where I can't. You probably still could go some places, but after New York, it's getting harder to do that."

"Don't I know it. I mean, there are some perks to being a superhero, but I don't need fangirls throwing themselves at me - however funny Nat thinks it is."

"She doesn't have to deal with guys like we do these fangirls - it would be hilarious if she did." I chuckled just imagining a crowd of fanboys desperate to be near her.

"She's a known assassin; she'd just shoot them if they annoyed her - and they would - but if they're that fanatical, that'd just be a souvenir or some stupid shit. Fury told her she can't shoot them unless she knows they're armed and coming at her." Clint took a large drink of his whiskey and refilled his glass. "Speaking of fangirls - how'd they manage to get that good of a picture of that girl kissing you?"

"She set it up with a photographer. I just caught her when she jumped out at me unexpectedly. I was setting her on her feet when she put her arms around my neck and kissed me. Tony's suing them for libel and defamation of character because of the story they headlined with that picture."

"Damn. I suppose now you both need to be seen in public together a couple times so there isn't a rumor of a breakup between you and Sarah."

"That's what I'm told. Things were so much easier in my time," I  griped.

"News moved a lot slower back then. That picture was trending in minutes; I was with Sarah when she saw it."

"Did she say anything to you? She didn't mention it until she got home that night. I had to learn about it from Jace." 

"I don't think she thought you were cheating on her, if that's what you're asking," Clint said, hesitating. I gestured for him to continue. "She was pissed - I've never seen her _that_ angry before. They retracted the story before the print edition came out, but by then, it was too little, too late."

"That woman admitted to it being a setup, at least."

"Mostly because Sarah called her and talked to her. It took Jarvis less than a minute to find out who she was and get her phone number." I looked at him in amazement. "Yeah, it was a surprisingly civil conversation and Jarvis recorded it for her. But enough depressing stories. Did Simmons really direct you like a puppet to teach you how to use their holo-table?"

"Yes. Nat told you, didn't she?"

"Of course! I heard there's a video?"

I laughed and pulled it up on my phone so he could watch it, my mood lightening as I thought about the young scientists. "They didn't have that program we use to pre-vis our missions, so I had to make do."

"Sarah's working on licensing and tweaking a few things before she releases it to the rest of Shield - but she sent them a prototype for them to tinker with."

"So what did you really want to talk about tonight that you didn't want Nat or Sarah to hear?" Clint asked, filling his glass again.

I felt my face flush. "Guy stuff. I'd feel really weird asking any female about prophylactics." Clint raised an eyebrow, but gestured for me to continue. "Not that it still isn't weird enough to talk about it at all, but I figured you were probably the easiest person to ask once I thought about it."

"Bruce?"

I shook my head. "Not convinced he has much more experience than I do. Would you ask Bruce about sex?"

"Shit, no! You're right. Tony's out, too. That's a whole different level of weirdness there since Sarah's his only daughter."

"You're telling me. We've already had the awkward dad/boyfriend conversation when we first started dating." I drained my glass and Clint did the same. He filled our glasses again and leaned back against the bench cushion, considering me for a long minute.

"So I have to ask this to know where to start. I'm assuming you're both still virgins if we're having this particular conversation." I nodded and he continued. "Sarah told me she was when we were leaving for Brazil, which made things a little more challenging, just so you know."

I held up a hand and shook my head, "Not sure I really want to know anything about Brazil, Clint."

He shrugged. "Mostly nothing to know; I didn't want you to kill me when we got back for touching your girl."

"What you have to do for a mission is different. You have to do things so everyone comes home; I get that. I would never hold that against either of you." I didn't want to think about it, but I understood.

"If you'd ask her," Clint said, holding my eyes, "she'd tell you the same thing I would. It was some kissing, petting, and touching - we did very little, actually; it sounded like a lot more than it really was for the audio bugs and it would've looked real from the cameras, but it wasn't. We showered together, but that was mostly so we could sign to each other. It was the only place in our suite that didn't have a camera in it."

I relaxed a little bit. I hadn't asked Sarah about it yet because I had been afraid to hear her answer. Clint's way at looking at things was unique, but I could tell he wasn't bullshitting me, he'd already drank enough that his inhibitions were almost non-existent.

"We haven't really done a lot yet. I know she wants to, I just...don't want to rush things." I could feel my cheeks flush and Clint was watching my reaction.

"Look, Steve, I get that and I respect you for it." He took another drink while he decided what to say. "The point is, because of Brazil, she now knows there's more to it than what you've been doing - sorry, that wasn't my intention, but the cat's out of the bag there."

I gave him a puzzled look. "I'm not sure what you're talking about."

Clint sighed. "So from what I got from Sarah is that you've finally moved past second base?"

"Why are you talking about baseball?" I frowned, still not sure what he was saying. I didn't understand the connection between Sarah and baseball, especially since she was indifferent about it.

Clint smiled, enjoying my confusion. "Because baseball is sometimes used as analogy for sex."

"I don't know what second base is," I admitted; my face felt beet red and my ears were burning.

"Shit! You are a freaking teenage boy, Steve! I'm going to introduce you to porn later just to complete your education." Clint drained his glass and refilled it before starting his explanation. "Okay, so first base is making out - I know you're past that one, I've seen you kissing."

I blushed and took a drink. "What's second base?"

"Second base is feeling each other up. Doesn't have to be totally naked, but can be depending on what you're both comfortable with. Got it?"

I nodded. "I got it, but we're past that point. What's after that?"

"Next is third base, which is oral sex - please tell me you know what that is because if I have to explain that -"

I cut him off, my face redder than before. "Yes, I know what that is! So just the three bases?" I could understand that, then.

"Nope. There's also a home run - which is actual intercourse. Sex is a lot like baseball, you want to get all the way around the bases before making it to home plate. Follow?"

"I think so." I took another drink of my whiskey as I felt my cheeks burning at his blunt words. "I don't think I'll ever look at baseball the same, but that means we're at third base, then."

Clint nodded and took a drink. "Good man. She driving you crazy yet wanting more than that?"

"You don't know the half of it. She just gets me so worked up I can't think straight. I've taken more cold showers since I've met her than anything else – and they don't even really help."

"You sound a little frustrated there, buddy," Clint smirked knowingly. "Whatever you two _haven't_ been doing also has Sarah wound so tight she needed to talk to Nat about it. She probably feels the same way you do, ready to jump out of your skin."

I nodded. "Before Sarah, I didn't know hard-ons could last that long. Like all day long if I don't do something about it. We've messed around, and that's great in its own way – don't get me wrong – I like that, too. It's just... I don't know about the rest."

"I'd hope you already know at least the basics after being in the Army and all," he said dryly. "Insert tab A into slot B -"

"Yeah, I understand how that part goes." I sipped my whiskey, trying to get the words out. "It's just that I know we're not ready for kids yet. Maybe someday, after I get _this_ time figured out, but for now, I need to know if there is a way to prevent that."

"God Steve! You've heard of condoms, right?"

"I've heard of them - a long time ago. We had them back during the war; they handed them out like gum and cigarettes to the soldiers back then. They're just for preventing disease, right? Or are they something regular people use now?"

"Yeah, I guess they would've been pretty new back then, huh." He shook his head in amazement at my naivety. "They're also used to prevent pregnancy since I'm pretty sure super-soldier's can't get STD's."

"So they're a contraceptive? The church doesn't condone the use of contraceptives."

"The church doesn't condone a lot of things, Steve," Clint said with a shrug. "I get that you Catholics like to follow rules, but I don't know many women who'd have sex without protection these days. If they don't want kids, they use contraceptives - end of story." He downed his whiskey again, reaching for the bottle to refill it.

"You all right?" Clint asked when I didn't say anything right away.

"Yeah, that's just a lot to take in." I sipped my whiskey as I considered what he told me. "The church probably wouldn't care for my choice to sign up for Project Rebirth, let alone most of what I did during the war."

"Maybe, but that's why God gave humans free will. God didn't say do whatever the church tells you to do, did He?" 

"No, He didn't," I said with a small smile. "You're right, Clint. I do have to say I've never used a condom for it's intended purpose."

"I don't want to know, Rogers."

"They kept my spare socks dry."

"Okaaaay. Anyways, you can get them almost anywhere and they're pretty effective. Some kinds fit nicer than others, so you'll just have to experiment until you find a brand you like. Just make sure if you're using lube that it's water based, not petroleum based."

"Lube? They're sticky otherwise?" To his credit, Clint didn't laugh at what was probably a strange question.

"No...lube is to make it feel good for both of you. I'd say to have Nat tell you what you do with it but I'm assuming you didn't want to have this conversation with her for a reason." His smile was wry, with a tinge of sadness to it.

"I'd think that you, of all people, could understand why I don't want to bring this up to Nat."

Clint nodded and drained his glass. "If you knew what the Red Room did to her..."

"I do know. She's my friend; I don't want to hurt her by making her talk about preventing something that will never be a consideration for her. I've seen how she looks at babies, Clint; it's heartbreaking. If she could have them, she would."

"In a heartbeat," he confirmed. "I know she says otherwise, but she would if she could."

I nodded. "I also think she knows that the price on _her_ head makes having children inadvisable.   Which is why Sarah was given to the Evans to raise, ultimately." I emptied my glass and leaned back, watching Clint process that. "There's always been a price on Tony's head, too."

"Yeah. I see what you mean." He took a long drink before speaking again. "But really, she would have enjoyed telling you what to do with lube."

"I'm sure she would have; Nat's kind of bossy sometimes."

Clint laughed again and poured himself another glass before refilling my glass, finishing off the bottle. "There's no _kind of_ about it! She _is_ bossy, Steve."

"Women. Can't live with 'em -" I said, tossing back my drink.

"Can't live without them. Wouldn't want to anyway," Clint finished with a shake of his head.

"Speaking of women, what's going on between you and Nat?" I asked. "You both have been acting a little differently around each other lately."

"We're back to being just friends again. Every time she's gonna be out of the country and under cover for a long time, she says I need to find a real girlfriend and try to have a normal relationship with a woman." He shrugged and grimaced. "Not that I know what normal is, but I think she worries about me having to be home alone for so long, not like I'm a grown ass man that can take care of myself or anything."

I snorted. Natasha's opinion of us was that we wouldn't survive a week without her and Sarah, but she _was_ the one who'd brought my beat up body home a couple weeks ago when I almost died, so maybe there was something to her theory. I knew Clint was deciding whether or not to tell me something else, so I waited until he figured it out for himself.

"Did Jace tell you he talked to me?" Clint finally asked.

I shook my head. "He said he was gonna, so I'm not surprised. I'm the last person that should be giving him advice and he hasn't told Sarah yet."

"Why not? Does he think she won't go for it? I didn't think she'd have a problem with them seeing each other - I know I don't."

"No, I think he wanted to tell her in person, not over the phone, but he had to leave as soon as it was clear that I was going to be okay. Sarah wanted him to stay, but Ops was expecting him back."

"I'm really glad you didn't die, Steve. When they told me what kind of condition you were in when you came home, I didn't have a lot of hope."

"So what did you tell Jace, if you don't mind me asking? I'm assuming he asked you if it was okay to see Nat - if that's what she wanted from him." I studied Clint, who refilled his glass and took a sip before looking up at me.

Clint nodded. "He did ask, and I told him I was fine with it; he wasn't stepping on my toes. I love Nat, don't get me wrong, but maybe we just aren't meant to be together like that. We're better friends or partners than lovers, I guess is probably the best way to put it. Jace is a good kid, a little young, but he seems like he cares for her."

"She acts different with him, but maybe he brings out a different side of her, one I just haven't seen before, but I've only known her for less than half a year; you've known her for what, seven?"

"Yeah. Best decision I've ever made, convincing her to join Shield. I was sent to kill her, you know," Clint said, taking a drink.

"I didn't, but I'm aware of her reputation before Shield. What did you see in her that made you disregard your orders?"

Clint smiled and shook his head. "I'd been watching her for a month before I finally got close enough to take a shot - but someone else got to her first, taking her captive. They knocked her down time and time again, but she still kept getting up and spitting in their faces." He met my eyes briefly. "She was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen, even beat to hell. I killed them all and brought her back with me to the Triskelion. We've been partners ever since." He took another drink. "Natasha, she doesn't trust many people, Steve. You know that?"

I nodded. "She trusts Jace, though. Has since the first day she met him. Sarah's remarked on that before."

"Bingo. That's why I'm okay with it, right there. She trusts him. That's all I need to know about his character."

"How do you take it when Nat gets hurt on a mission? I know she heals almost as fast as I do, but she's taken some pretty good hits some of those times."

"I try not to think about it. It's part of the job description, but that doesn't mean I like it. It's better if I'm there with her than if I'm not and find out later when she's being wheeled in on a gurney."

"Because then you know what happened instead of letting your mind run away with you?" I asked.

"Yeah. I know that every time we go out there's the possibility that one of us won't be coming home and if it came down to it, I'd rather it be me than her."

"It's much harder to be the one left behind than it is to make the sacrifice play. I've been on both sides before and I know that I don't think I could handle being left behind again." I drained my glass and set it on the table firmly. "That day in Jahra, when I watched Sarah get shot?" I shook my head, struggling to find the right words to describe the feeling.

"It felt like you were the one who should've been hit." Clint drained his glass and smacked it on the table.

"Exactly."

"Ready to head home? It's later than I thought it was. They'll be back soon."

"I'll pay the tab and we can go." I slid out of the booth when he nodded and went up to the bar to pay. He tossed a tip on the table for the waitress and walked outside a little unsteadily.

"I need to make a stop on the way, if that's okay with you?"

"Sure. Where to?"

"CVS."

There was a 24 hour one not far from Clint and Natasha's apartment, so I took him there. He wasn't walking very steadily, so I figured I'd better go in with him. Clint bee-lined straight to the condoms and started handing me different boxes.

"Hold on, Clint! I can't possibly need this many," I said, trying to put some back.

"Yeah you do because your girl is hot! Here's the lube."

He shoved a couple colored tubes at me. I looked around and grabbed a little basket to toss everything in. "What do I need that for?" I tried to read the back of one of the tubes but Clint was throwing more stuff in the basket, muttering to himself.

"You don't, but she will," he said. "Nat says that they're uncomfortable without lube, not that we need to use condoms anyway." I groaned - I didn't really want to hear about their sex life. "For us it's more to contain the mess than anything else."

"I don't want to know! Are you drunk?" I asked bluntly.

"Yup. How are you not?" 

We turned to go to the checkout and I set the boxes on the counter, my cheeks flushing hotly. Clint set a package of powdered sugar covered doughnuts on the counter and took them back after the clerk rang them up.

"Thanks, man. I _love_ these things!" He opened the package, eating them as he staggered to the door.

"I'm so sorry. It's easier to work with him than against him when he's like this," I apologized to the clerk, who was smiling at his enthusiasm and handed her some cash.

"It's all right. At least your boyfriend's a happy drunk. Drive safe."

I flushed at her assumption. "He's not my boyfriend, but thanks." I grabbed the plastic bag and hurried after Clint. He got himself in the car and I tossed the bag in the back seat.

"Guess what the girls are shopping for tonight?" he was licking the powdered sugar off his fingers, having already downed the doughnuts.

"I don't know. What?" I watched the traffic, waiting for the light to turn green.

"Dildos."

"What?! Why?" I was sure that this was Natasha's idea somehow. It had to be.

"Nat said Sarah needed to expand her horizons or maybe your horizons. I dunno which - both sounds good."

The light finally turned and I hit the gas, ready to get him back to his place before he could shock me anymore. "I really don't know if I'm ready for that, Clint."

"Fine. Tell Sarah 'no' then when she wants you to use toys on her. I bet she'd like them."

"I can't believe I'm asking this, but does Nat like toys?"

"More for foreplay - but I enjoy using them on her; I like watching her climax. She makes this little noise -"

"More than I needed to know, buddy," I said, cutting him off before he could finish his sentence. "We're here. Need help getting upstairs?"

"Might as well come up with me and wait for them inside." I got Clint up to his apartment and let him collapse on couch with a groan. I texted Natasha to see when they were coming back.

 

*      *

Half an hour later, I heard the door open and looked over to see Natasha and Sarah come in with a bunch of shopping bags. Clint had passed out on the other end of the couch already, so I was just watching the History Channel and waiting for them to get back.

"What'd you do to Clint?" asked Sarah, taking a picture of him with her phone.

"He did it to himself," I protested. "I didn't make him do anything."

"How much did he have to drink?" Natasha gave me a look and I tried to not look guilty as I smiled.

"Half a bottle of Jack and a couple of beers."

"Big bottle?"

"Yup."

"Idiot. He'll be fine by tomorrow morning," Natasha said with a sigh.

"He hates mornings," Sarah said, giggling.

"Even more so tomorrow." Natasha looked me up and down and seemed satisfied at what she saw. "Did you guys have fun?"

"We had a good talk. Thanks for letting Clint out to play." I leaned down to give her a hug and let her kiss my cheek before turning to wait at the door.

"Bye Nat. See you tomorrow." Sarah waved and I followed her downstairs. She went to put her bags in the back seat and noticed the CVS bag.

"You went shopping with Clint?"

"Not willingly. He wanted doughnuts, among other things." I tried not to be embarrassed by the things in the bag, but failed, my face flushing. Thank goodness it was dark out.

"That explains the powdered sugar all over," Sarah said as she brushed off the passenger seat before getting in.

"Looks like you and Nat had a productive night. I didn't know that stores stayed open this late during the week."

Sarah shot me an amused look. "Well, the stores we went to are just now opening for the night."

"I don't want to know then. I'm perfectly happy with my ignorance."

Sarah laughed and patted my arm. "You'll see it all eventually; who knows - you might even like it. To quote someone we both know, 'you might have missed a few things doing time as a Capsicle.'"

"Tony told you he said that?" I raised an eyebrow at her and she grinned.

"Nat did. I'm still amazed that you've never punched him once for all of his smart ass remarks."

"Some of them were quite amusing...after the fact."

I smiled at her and she grinned, taking my hand. I ran my thumb lightly over her knuckles, savoring the feel of her small hand in mine. I pulled into the garage at our building and parked. Sarah got out and spent a moment brushing powdered sugar off of her seat and herself. I reached back and grabbed the bags before Sarah could and met her on the other side of the car to look at the damage.

"Sorry. I didn't know he made such a mess; I'll clean it out this weekend for you," I said apologetically as we started walking inside.

"It was starting to need a cleaning again anyway. I think I got the worst of if off of the seat for now. Your place or mine?"

"Mine," I answered, having already thought about that. We'd mostly been staying at Sarah's since we tended to watch movies every night after supper – she was still helping me work my way through my list– but after the conversations I had had with Clint and Nat today, I felt more comfortable in my own space. "See you in a few?"

She nodded as she stopped at her door. I handed over her bags and she gave me an innocent look, her golden brown eyes open wide. I gulped, knowing that she was up to no good.


	38. The Right Partner

Sarah's POV 

I unlocked my door and went inside, taking the bags with me into my bedroom. I tossed them on my bed - none of this stuff was really for tonight; I needed a little time to figure out how they worked first. I stripped and got into the shower, letting the hot water relax me.

I'd had a lot of fun shopping with Natasha tonight - even if it wasn't the normal kind of shopping. I'd vented to her earlier this week about my frustration with Steve's stubbornness. Natasha had been quite amused by my sexual frustration, which was why we'd planned this impromptu shopping trip tonight after she'd texted me to say Steve was going out for drinks with Clint.

It was harder now for me than it'd been before Clint and I had been in Brazil. I'd gotten a taste of what intimacy felt like and I missed that feeling. Before, I hadn't had a solid idea of what I wanted from Steve, I was just happy to spend time with him. 

Now I knew I wanted a physical relationship, too. Part of my frustration stemmed from the fact that I'd went from intense stimulation several times a day to not doing anything other than kissing and mild petting. Natasha said I was going through withdrawal, for lack of a better description.

I stepped out of the shower and dried off before picking out one of the halter top and thong sets that I'd worn in Brazil. I put it on and looked in the mirror and blushed, suddenly understanding _why_  Clint had liked these so much. They hinted at everything they covered until you got closer and could actually see through them. I put on my light sweater and grabbed my phone and keys before I headed over to Steve's.

He was still in the shower, so I switched out my laundry and started a new load. I walked into the bedroom and plugged my phone in, taking off my light sweater and setting it on the chair. I turned on the bedside lamp and flicked off the overhead lights. The CVS bag from earlier was on the bed, and I peeked inside to see what he'd bought that had made him so embarrassed earlier; his flush had been obvious to me since I could see in the dark.

I smiled to myself when I saw what was inside: a wide assortment of condoms and lubes.  I made a mental note to thank Clint later - I was certain that this was his doing. Steve wouldn't have bought them on his own; I wasn't totally sure he even knew what condoms _were_ , now that I thought about it...and I could see totally Clint telling Steve that he needed them without telling him what they were for.

I opened a random package and put it in the nightstand drawer on my side, along with one of the bottles of lube that said _for her_. The rest I left in the bag and set it on Steve's desk. I'd made a plan of action, so I sat down on the bed, intending to catch Steve before he could get dressed. I usually got further if I surprised him than if I waited until we were both in bed.

I heard the water turn off and a couple minutes later, Steve came walking into the bedroom, a towel wrapped around his hips. His eyes widened as I stood up and walked over to him, wrapping my arms around his neck and going up on my toes to kiss him. He tasted like whiskey, I determined as I stroked his tongue with mine.

He put one arm around me and I ran my hands over his toned body, pushing the towel off of his hips and taking his other hand and putting it on my ass. I deepened the kiss, backing him up until his legs met the bed. I pushed at him and he sat down suddenly, pulling me with. I boldly climbed into his lap, straddling his hips.

 

*      *          *

Steve's POV

I put my hands on Sarah's hips to keep her from wriggling against me, splaying them over her pert ass, kneading it as I felt her barely covered breasts brush my chest. Sitting back up on my hips, her golden eyes were dark with desire as she lightly ran her hands over my body. Leaning back, she skated her fingers over the planes of my chest, following the contours of my muscles. My skin quivered under her hands and I closed my eyes, just letting myself enjoy the feeling instead of thinking of when I needed to stop her.

"All the way up on the bed, Steve," she ordered as she nipped at my ear.

I scooted us further up on the bed like she wanted and let her push me down on my back. She crawled up on top of me, rocking forward to kiss me, hands stroking my chest and abs. She kissed down my neck to my chest, licking, blowing on my sensitized skin, and flicking her tongue, making me jump slightly. I pulled her back up before she could reach my throbbing cock, kissing her hungrily.

She caught my hands and placed them on her breasts, leaning forward as I palmed them through the silky fabric of her opaque top. Her nipples were taut peaks already and I ran my thumbs over them, making her gasp against my mouth. I rolled her nipple between my thumb and forefinger, muffling her whimper.

I ran my hand over her curves, squeezing her ass before running my hands down her toned legs. She rocked against me, rubbing my cock through the fabric, which wasn't helping my control. I groaned and she smiled wickedly. If she kept that up, I was going to explode, it felt so damn good.

I ran my hands back up her legs, under her top, resting my hands on her smooth hips, rubbing circles on her taut belly with my thumbs. She reached down and gracefully eased her top off, baring herself completely to me.

I exhaled loudly, and her smile deepened, her dimples showing. She leaned forward to kiss me again and her soft, full breasts filled my palms for me to tease and knead the way she liked best. Breathing a little quicker, I moved suddenly, flipping her onto her back.

I leaned over her, careful to keep most of my weight off her so as not to crush her and captured her lips. Breaking the kiss, I slowly worked down her neck, nibbling at her collarbones, capturing one sweet pink nipple in my mouth and suckling, making her gasp and arch her back. I tweaked the other nipple, rolling it in my fingers and kneading the soft flesh.

She speared her hands in my hair, then ran them over my back, feeling the tight muscles there. She slid her fingers down my belly, reaching for my cock. I grabbed her hands and brought them back up over her head, not letting her rush my exploration of her body. I licked down to her belly and nibbled on her hip, making her gasp as I found a sensitive spot.

I looked up at her questioningly as I hesitated at the junction of her legs. She nodded, breathing shallowly as she lifted her hips so I could pull her sheer underwear off. She watched me part her curls and brush my thumb over her clit. A shiver ran over her skin and I knelt between her legs, parting her with one hand as I brought my face down to her clit and ran my tongue over it, causing her to wriggle beneath me.

I sucked and blew over the little nub and she moaned softly, hot and wet with need as I eased one finger into her tight cunt, slowly at first then faster until she was panting. I eased in a second finger, but that was too much for her and she arched her back, bucking against me as her head fall back as I felt her muscles spasm around my finger. I watched her orgasm with a great sense of satisfaction, the sight turned me on intensely.

She pulled me back up to her and kissed me with the taste of her still on my lips. I felt her small hand firmly grasp my cock, running her fingers over its full length, lightly cupping my testicles. I knew I was leaking pre-cum as I felt her rub it over the head of my cock. I closed my eyes and groaned, dropping my head into the crook of her neck. That only seemed to embolden her and she reached over into the nightstand drawer and pulled out a little packet. I watched her tear it open and realized what it was as she rolled the condom over my cock.

She lined me up with her entrance, pulling me forward by my hips. I slowly eased into her, knowing that two fingers had been a tight fit, and my cock was a lot larger than my fingers. Her head fell back and she moaned my name. She was so wet I slid in easily, her tight heat scorching me. I stopped when I met resistance, and I felt her tense.

Leaning down to kiss her, I paused for a long moment, letting her adjust to my girth, even though it was killing me to stay still right now - she needed this moment. With one hand, I teased her nipples, rolling and tweaking until she was moaning and rubbing her legs against me. With a firm push, I broke her barrier and seated myself fully within her. Sarah's eyes were closed and she was tense beneath me again.

"Are you okay, Sarah?" I kissed her gently, "I can stop if you want."

She shook her head. "Don't stop - I'll be okay in a moment. You're really big, Steve."

She ran her hands over my shoulders and back and I smiled as I kissed her again. I started to move when I felt her relax and the sensation was incredible, even better than I'd thought it would feel like. I could feel her quick breaths on my neck turning into gasps and moans as she rocked her hips, matching my pace.

"Mmm, Steve, that feels so good!"

Her fingernails scraped the skin of my back lightly and I felt her muscles clench around me, pushing me over the edge. I pumped into her firmly and captured her lips, swallowing what felt like a scream as I buried myself deep inside her one last time, filling the condom with a groan. I collapsed on her for a long moment, breathing hard and unable to get my body to cooperate.

She was almost boneless in her repletion and I felt a deep sense of satisfaction that I'd made her that way. A small part of me rejoiced that I'd been her first, just as she'd been mine; it had been worth the wait. After a long moment, she stirred, reaching up to kiss me deeply. I liked the feel of her skin on mine and I rolled us so she was on top of me and wrapped my arms around her.

"Mmmh. That was very nice, Steve," Sarah whispered in my ear, her voice rough from all the vocalization she'd done.

I smiled into her lips. "Such an understatement. You're feisty when you're riled, doll." I looked over at my arm to see the marks she had made on my arm with her teeth trying to keep quiet.

She kissed the bruise before looking back over at me. "I just couldn't wait any longer. All the touching and kissing had me so turned on I thought I was going to explode if we didn't do something more."

I smiled wryly. "Believe me, I know. I felt like I was going to crawl out of my skin – that's what took me so long to come to bed. The cold shower wasn't working very well, so I finally gave up. And then you ambushed me."

"It didn't seem like you minded." She grinned at me mischievously and I couldn't help but smile back.

"Someone made me see that holding back wasn't doing you any favors." I brushed my hand over her face, the silky skin soft under my calloused hands. She leaned into the caress, closing her eyes briefly.

"True. I'm glad I waited for you; I couldn't imagine a better partner." Her smile was euphoric and I felt a sharp pain in my chest as I went back in time for a brief moment.

I know she saw the fleeting emotion that passed across my face as her words reminded me of something I'd told Peggy. The happiness on her face dimmed slightly and she tried to lay her head back down on my chest. I wouldn't let her, though, instead rolling us so her face was even with mine.

"You're the best thing that's ever happened to me, Sarah," I told her.

"I did it again, didn't I? You know, for as much as I've said I don't want to hurt you, I feel like that's all I do. Over and over again. How can you stand to be around me?"

"I'm sorry, Sarah. I've hurt you, too, and that's not acceptable to me." I brought a hand up to her face, stroking her cheek with one finger, my eyes holding her golden brown ones that were a little shinier than usual. "It's not like you could've known what was said to me more than 70 years ago. Some things are entirely coincidental."

"Coincidental or not-"

I gave her a quick kiss. "Because of you - _only you_ \- I've finally started to _live_ again. I've been alive since I came out of the ice, but it's taken you coming into my life to show me what it's like to do something other than just exist." I took her hand and kissed it, then laid it on my chest so she could feel my heartbeat, covering it with my own.

"Steve?"

"Feel that?" She nodded. "Before I met you, this was just an organ that moved blood through my body. Now it feels things, emotions that I've forgotten, and I'm still relearning them. Some of them are easier than others, but that's just how it is."

"No one ever said being human was easy." Her smile was wry and I thought of how often she had to pretend to be a normal human herself when she was anything but.

"No, it's not easy. There's no way of knowing when something you say will stop me in my tracks, Sarah. You know that."

"Yeah, I do."

"I've waited a lifetime for you, Sarah. Yes, I loved Bucky and Peggy _before_ I knew you," I caught her eyes with my own, holding her golden brown eyes captive with my gaze. "But I'm learning to love you in a different way, and it's terrifying to me." She gave me a radiant smile and I kissed her again. "I love you, Sarah Maria Evans. I love you so much."

"I love you, too, Steve, but you knew that already," she whispered against my lips and I crushed her to me, my heart swelling with joy.

 

*         *

This is the end of Book 1, Steve and Sarah's story, but don't worry - you'll see more of them in the next book of the series: _Hello Sergeant (Bucky Barnes)._

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed it!

Rogerthatbarnes

 

 

 


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